Reply #4: There's even more to nursing than being a fail safe for doctors

[Warpy]

even though one of the most miserable jobs we face is questioning orders and telling His Eminence that if he wants an overdose administered to a patient, he's going to have to come in and do it himself. Been there, done that.

What people don't know is how we're constantly assessing our patients. A seemingly innocent conversation about the weather or pop culture is telling us if the patient is alert and oriented, if his speech is affected, what his emotional status is, and how effective some of his comfort medications are. That sort of thing can't be done by people right off the street who don't know what they're looking for.

Bozos in administration always think nurses just wander around with clipboards recording a patient's bowel movements and dispensing pills that have already been counted out by a pharmacist. They seemingly have no clue that the best predictor of a good outcome for a patient is adequate staffing by licensed nurses. The first place they always try to cut costs is in nursing because they have no clue in the world what nurses actually do for their patients in terms of ongoing assessment and early intervention at signs of complication.

This nurse has had it and won't be going back to bedside nursing any time in the foreseeable future. Doing my job in spite of administration was possible twenty years ago. It no longer is, thanks to the constant burdens of non nursing functions like housekeeping added to an unsafe patient load. Sorry folks, but you're on your own. If you are unfortunate enough to go to hospital, please find family members who can stay with you. They're your best hope now. Nurses do their best, but there aren't enough of them to keep you safe.