General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Black Nurse Sues Hospital for Not Letting Her Take Care of White Baby [View all]rainbow4321
(9,974 posts)Management will take the path of least resistance...if it comes down to a (wrongfully) agitated/loud patient or family member and a nurse who is trying to just do her job, they will always side with the patient.
Case in point...our hospital policy is that NO one can sleep IN the bed with a patient. At all. I cannot tell you how many times we walk into a room and the patient's significant other is curled up in bed with the patient. And these couples don't care if they are in a multipatient bed room (3 to a room)..talk about the other patients/families looking uncomfortable)
Some nurses choose to ignore it, then when a nurse comes on and tries to explain it to the patient and his s.o, that nurse is the BAD nurse, how dare you, we are going to report you!
So one day I walk in on such a couple (older couple in this case) and the wife is in the hospital bed with the patient. I explain that for safety purposes the hospital doesn't allow people to get into bed with the patients. Keeping in mind that in the past when I had turned a blind eye to such behavior from other patients/s.o's and my manager had seen the couples, he would come to me and be irate that I had "allowed it".
Ok....so I decided to do the "right" thing this time.
What happens? The patient's wife goes to complain to my unit's assistant manager that I was not allowing her to sleep in her husband's hospital bed, turns out the wife was an employee of the hospital who the asst. manager knew, and he then profusely apologizes to the wife, gives me a bunch of lame excuses on why it is suddenly OK to allow the wife to be in the hospital bed, and then the wife is standing there looking at me all smug like *I* am the horrible, terrible, awful person that she has gotten revenge on.
Sometimes you just cannot win as a nurse when it comes to hospital management.
We've had patients and family members get verbally abusive with us (as nurses) and when I have tried to tell management that I have rights, too, as an employee to not be harrassed/verbally abused and want to be re-assigned, they look at me amused and go welllll, you know...we'll see. Not a single management team member will go in and tell the patient "you will treat our staff with respect and these outbursts will not be tolerated". I've even got to a point where I have told management that I will call the hospital police up to the room each time I am yelled at/screamed at/cursed at...and these are not rent a cop police...I work at a federal facility and they are a "real" police force.
Good grief, if you are allowed feel safe and harrassment free while working at a federal facility, where CAN you feel safe at?