Archive for the ‘life in the ER’ Category

help!

OMG! I’m the one who needs to be resuscitated!

I get to my late afternoon shift and things are already outta control! Sunday Night Special! Patients wall-to-wall. No available beds. Missing wheelchairs, codes blasting on the PA, screamie-meemies, chest pains.  Anthony Chan’s being a bigger-than-normal pain in the ass —

VOLUNTEER, what part of “limping” do you not understand? Get my patient a wheelchair, stat!

I check the hallways, L & D, parking lots – nada, nowhere, now what?

I’ve gotta return with wheels pronto, so I head into unfamiliar territory, open a daunting door with a “Staff Only” sign and step into a brightly lit waiting area, where I discover:

Two Empty Wheelchairs!  Voila! Yay! Perfect!

Uhm… WAIT!  What’s that abandoned patient doing lying on that gurney? Read the rest of this entry »

Prescription for a Happy Face

Health isn’t the only thing that needs to get better in Hospitals. Customer dissatisfaction is more contagious than the Flu!  Think about it. Pre-internet when a customer was dissatisfied he’d maybe tell ten people, but in the current social media world complaints broadcast to thousands… maybe millions if your YouTube hits big.

Patient Satisfaction Overhaul (Finally!)

Did you see that L.A. Times article over the weekend about how federal payments to hospitals are being tied to customer satisfaction? That’s a major topic at the hospital where I volunteer. Everyone’s suddenly scrambling to figure out ways to make sure customer surveys are filled out positively — OR ELSE!

At my hospital they hire more people to act as Liasons between the Patient’s family and the Hospital.  I guess it helps everyone navigate the system, but we could do more. Much more. A great example of Hospital know-WOW comes from Pittsburgh Children’s Hospital.

Caped Cleaners

It’s a bird, It’s a plane…

I mean how cool would it be for anyone entering the hospital to look up and see Super Hero Window Washers? Read the rest of this entry »

Working in the hospital has the side benefit of Sensitivity Training. I’m not referring to overcoming prejudices, though that’s certainly a big part of helping people. I’m talking about assumptions as in, do not make them. When I make them, they backfire.  Learn from my mistakes. 

Generalizations lead to Oops Moments —

Part of my job as an ER Volunteer is to take Patients in labor up to the 3rd Floor — the Floor for Labor and Delivery and Post Partum. It’s where we get to look through the windows and see all of those cutey-patooty-newborns in their first hours of life. And it’s a Floor where Patients usually get to take home more than just a hospital bill.  For months whenever I’d meet people in the elevator going up to the 3rd Floor  I’d say something like — Read the rest of this entry »

Be nice, or else…

On my ER shift, a Little Kid’s freaking out about having to get stitches, so I ask him if he can keep a secret? Uh-huh.

Wanna know our  SECRET CODE WORD ?

Yeah!…
…so I whisper: “Owww!”

Minutes later when  Dr. A dabs numbing cream on his wound, the kid yells, “Owww!” So I SHUSH! him about giving away the CODE WORD and he actually giggles — PLUS I get a “trying-not-to-smile-but-I-can’t-help-it” from Dr. A! So it’s a win/WIN of epic proportions! (My Mom would be so proud!)

Then in Triage, ANTHONY shouts at me for taking too many visitors back to see their Mom (c’mon Chan!) which is sooo frustrating! As I’ve said before — working in the ER is a LOVE|HATE situation!

ER Ambivalence —
THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE WHATEVER! Read the rest of this entry »

CAUTION: Psycho Janitor!

Working at a HOSPITAL is like working at STRESS CENTRAL. Everyone’s “on edge.”

• Going through an uncomfortable procedure is stressful.
• Removing your clothes for a stranger is stressful.
• Waiting for test results is stressful.
• Visiting someone you love who is in pain is stressful.
• Going through labor (and the next 18 years) is stressful.
• Working a 12 hour shift is stressful.
• Receiving your hospital bill is stressful.

I totally get it, but—

I still have no idea why a member of the Janitorial Staff completely went off on me yesterday. Read the rest of this entry »

Sorry, Mom — not feeling so optimistic right now.

Volunteering in the ER isn’t that hard most of the time. Though we help patients in stressful moments of need, we usually send them home with a fix or admit them upstairs for tests or rush them to the OR — and then move-on, “Next!” But every now and then I get sucked into the depth of someone’s despair and like quicksand it consumes me. The more experienced Volunteers, Doctors and Nurses appear to be affected the least. I guess that’s how they get through it.

TOLERATING TRAGEDY

I feel like our nation is experiencing an epidemic of “Desensitizeditis!”

Daily we hear about another random act of violence, often involving a gun and a possibly-bullied, off-balanced human who may or may not play video games, who watches a lot of violent movies and thinks it’s cool to go down in history as a cover story in People. No guilt or sadness over creating chaos and cruelty. No fear of repercussion. Just the overwhelming desire to do something devastating and LOUD. One last chance to be heard.

We as a society hear about it, read about it, Tweet about it —  and then move-on, “Next!” Meanwhile innocent people lose their lives. Family members and friends will never ever be the same. Civilization continues to sink. Maybe we can’t bear to focus on our own loss of safety and wellbeing. FEELING POWERLESS is not a good feeling. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m trying to remain calm, but I just finished my ER shift and I need to vent. Earlier, as I was driving to the Employee Parking Lot, a very Pregnant Woman was walking in the crosswalk talking on her cell. A man in the car to the left of me barreled through the crosswalk. He didn’t seem to notice or care about the Preggy Pedestrian. And the Mama-to-Be was so engrossed in the conversation, she wasn’t thinking about protecting her baby. The weirdest part was that no one seemed to notice — not the Driver, not the Pedestrian, only ME.

Am I in the Twilight Zone?

So just as I’m exclaiming “Whaaaa?” I drive into the parking structure that’s completely packed. I search every level and finally find one measly spot. But it’s not a trouble-free-spot because on one side a car is parked in an intruding slant over the double line and on the other side the neighboring car has been pushed so far over by the car next to it, it’s squishing over my other boundary line as well. Why aren’t there any boundaries in human behavior? Why is everyone pushing everyone else over the edge? Read the rest of this entry »