“Can Nurses Care
Too Much?” - THERESA BROWN, R.N. NY Times posted on February
4, 2009, 11:25
am - http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/04/can-nurses-care-too-much/
“If he dies I don’t know what I’m going to do,” I confided to the dayshift
nurse. She looked at me, then looked down at her papers and nodded. This is
what it means to be a nurse in oncology, a no-win situation where compassion
routinely gets hijacked by grief.” When I read this I ask myself “Why do nurses
care about their patients so much?” But then I realized it’s a humanity thing.
We care about the ones we are around, the ones we help, and most importantly
the ones who care for us back.
The guy in the story had a brain bleed from some of his medications that he
was on. Theresa was his nurse, and of
course she cared too much. When Theresa was doing his first neurological tests,
during this visit to the hospital, he wasn’t following her commands. Her next
visit into his room, he grabbed her firmly and asked “So am I going to live or
am I going to die?” Form this moment you can tell Theresa cared too much, she
said “I wish I could look in a crystal ball and find out, but I can’t.”
Theresa had taken a few shifts off since that visit. She called in one day
to ask how he was doing. The office said “C.M.O,” C.M.O. means Comfort Measures
only, ultimately that means that they were withdrawing care. Theresa knew that her
patient had passed. She headed to the hospital; first person she saw was her patient’s
wife. She asked if Theresa wanted to see her patient, she said no, instead they
talked about her patient and his wife’s lives. Her last words were “I love you.”
“It hurts even now. A nurse on my floor said, “You girls get too attached,”
and she’s right, of course.” Theresa said, finishing off the article. So why do
nurses care too much? Why do they get attached?
This was a great article to post and comment on, this topic interests me in that there are many in the medical field that are placed in the positions that they are in because of who they know and not what they know. Maybe it’s the years of witnessing tragedy and the worst end of someone life, but many need to relearn the first principle of why they initially choose the profession they are in now. It is rare to come across a nice, willing and gentle nurse or front operations person that truly cares for the reasons that you are at their window or facility. I believe in my experiences that they are the front lines of why people return or don’t return for follow up care.
ReplyDeleteThink of when nurses and doctors were in the roles that they were in because of the passion and caring character that they were blessed with way back in the day. When it was not about numbers and budgets or payroll amounts, when it was expected to have the nurturing ability to make a patient feel welcomed and at home in their desperate time of need. So when there is a nurse that acts like he or she really cares, compliment them and let them know that you appreciate their devotion and time to bringing the unhealthy and wounded back to the state of where they ought to be. This is important to me in that this is the field that I one day will be a part of, so suggestions are more than welcome.
I really can’t agree with you on the nurses being non-warm human beings. I have been in the ER multiple times and have never had a unhappy nurse. I can always count on them to cheer me up. They tend to ask me what happened like normal. But then they’ll go right on to a joke to get me laughing. So I would have to say that it not rare to find a nice nurse. I don’t know everything and nowhere close to it but don’t people come back for check ups. When they don’t they are either hurt/sick more or cant afford the re-visit. The whole view of a nurse is to be a polite nice respectful person. The money/ payroll should have nothing to with it. I don’t know this for a fact but I’m just going off of the stories I hear from my cousins. I have a total of four family members who are nurses and three firemen. So I get to sit around and listen to them talk back and forth about shit that happened at work. Even sometimes they will let me shadow them when they’re on shift. To see the stuff that they see if a life changing experience. So I guess what I’m saying is that I give thanks to all medical workers for what they do for us.
ReplyDeleteRoy rock
ReplyDelete12/6/12
Blog response #6
This blog is definitively better, but it still can us some work. It did a better job on describing things such as the C.M.O which is a nice change from your previous blog. Also it described in further detail what the nurse thoughts probably were and how she truly did fell about her patent. I find it strange that at the end of the dude’s life that his wife did not even want to say good bye. However there were a couple of part that where hard to understand who it was referring to. It is an interesting blog, considering it shows the point of view of the nurses rather than just showing the patients point of view like most article do. I like that it states that the last words the wife said to her husband were “I love you,” it is not often that you are able to say nice last words to a relative. It is like if you get into an argument then the person you got into an argument is more likely to die soon after which then really sucks. I am really happy that I have never had this happen to me, even though I have lost a couple loved ones over the years. I am also am interested why nurses care so much about their patients especially if they know that the patient is likely to die.