Ms. Whispers

You can usually judge how the night is going to go by looking in the waiting room. Some sadist one thought it was a good idea to put the time clock in the waiting area. Granted, time clocks are every where in the hospital, but they want you to clock in on your unit. So, you get to walk to the waiting area and get a good look at what you are in for.

Here are the different scenarios that I have encountered:

1. Almost empty waiting area: Yay! Means that the evening is going to start out somewhat slow and you get a chance to warm up to being at work.
2. Packed waiting area, but the people just look up at you and then continue what they were doing: Means that they have not been waiting long, we must be getting them in and out quick. Yay! Hopeful that the patients and family are friendly due to not waiting long.
3. Packed waiting area, this time the people give you a hard stare, and continue to stare as you walk towards the rooms. You can feel their eyes burning holes in you as you walk. As if it is you that is keeping them from entering the sacred area of the all-knowing: Means that people will be complaining all night, they will want food, want to drink, want to go, threaten to leave AMA (side note: this is not a threat when we are busy), and blame you all night for them having to wait so long.

As I was driving to work, I had decided that no matter what, I was going to try my best to be as friendly and nice as possible.  I am here to help the sick, here to take care of people. I remind myself they are scared and worried and that with enough time and care, they will understand we are trying to do our best. Positive attitude.

Then, I step off the elevator and enter the waiting area. I am hit with scenario #3. *sigh* So, I speed up my steps a bit to get to my area.

This particular area is near triage and you carry 5 patients instead of the usual 4. Also, when people are put in the hall from triage for whatever reason, they can see the nurses station and the doc. Also, this nurses station is..oh about the size of my bathroom. Now, let me give you a visual. At home, when I am in the bathroom, and L. and my two girls walk in, I feel like I can’t breathe. Now….picture a unit secretary, a Doc, 2 nurses, a tech and sometimes a PA all trying to work from the same amount of space. Plus, on the desk/station area, there are 4 computers, 3 phones, monitors hanging from the ceiling, and the x-ray/CT screen. Needless to say we are tripping over each other the whole time we are there.

One time, I slid in the seat behind the Doc to be able to use a computer. I was happily writing away when the doc saw something on his computer that made him jump up. His chair hit me and caused me to go flying towards the counters. Needless to say, after a couple of hours, one begins to become quite cranky.

So, off I go to the mini station. I see my co-worker who says “welcome to hell”.  I reply with “that bad huh?” She points to the unit secretary’s computer and there is a bottle of Vodka sitting there. *eyebrow raise* Hummm.. I glance around and there are bodies everywhere. Triage has overflowed and is taking up our area. And every one of them is giving us “the stare”.

So, I get report and start going about my usual business. One of the triage nurses wheels over a lady on a bed and places her by the even smaller room that holds our pyxis, needles, etc. So, any time we need something in that room, we have to step around the bed to get in there. As I continue on with my stuff for my patients, she begins to start waving people down. We are all running around like crazy trying to get things done, but I stop for a minute, because I am a caring person like that. So, I ask her what she needs. She whispers something I can not understand. I lean forward….”I’m sorry, what was that?” So, she points to the bathroom and then points to herself. Ok…..  So, I go to the triage nurse and ask what is up with the whispering lady in the hall. She replies with “here for abdominal pain”. I tell her that the lady needs to use the restroom. She kinda of sighs and says I will get to her in a minute. So, I explain that I just wanted to make sure it was ok for her get up and go. She tells me that it is ok, no concerns. So off I go.

I walk back over to the lady and undo the side rail and tell her that she can go to the bathroom. So, I start to walk off when I hear her, at least I think, saying something. I turn around and she is pointing to the IV bag, the bathroom, her, the bed all while whispering something incoherently. I walk back over and ask her what is wrong. The above continues. I explain that the bag can be taken off the hook and she can walk over there.  

So, off I go back to triage, while the flags on my charts are being pulled left and right. I am getting behind and I can feel it. So, I approach the triage nurse. “Hey, can whispers walk? Because she is just pointing and stuff.” Yes, I nicknamed her whispers. Because, the triage nurse knew exactly who I was talking about. Before you think I am evil, I did ask what was up with the whispering. Triage nurse replies with “dunno, she was doing it in triage. When I asked why, she said she was hard of hearing.” WTH? How does being hard of hearing make you whisper…ah hell, I do not have time to figure that one out. I explain that all she is doing it pointing and whispering. Mind you, from her bed, to the bathroom, is maybe 15 steps, tops. So, the triage nurse sighs again and replies with “she can walk”. So, off I go back to whispers. This time, I take the IV bag off the hook and show her that she can carry it and walk to the bathroom. She begins to whisper again, pointing at the bathroom, her legs, the bag….etc. At this point, I am starting to get a little peeved. About that time, the triage nurse rounds the corner and sees whispers pointing. So, she walks up and says “what is it?” More pointing. So, we pull the rail back up and unlock the bed and wheel her to the bathroom door. Triage nurse says “do you think you can walk from here?” So, after a few rocking movements, whispers gets up and sits there and points to the door, the bag, the door…you get the picture. In my head I am counting to 10. I mean, really? Triage nurse tells her “I got the bag, just get up and go to the bathroom.” We get her in there and give each other one of those “it is going to be a long night” look and continue on.

A few minutes later, she exits the bathroom, no bag. Begins to point to the bag, the bed, the bag… I am thinking “*@^!%!*#&! So, I go get the bag off the hook in the bathroom, put it on the hook on the bed, wait till she gets on the bed and wheel her back to her spot by the med room door. Finally, time to get caught up.

About 30 minutes later, whispers is waving me down again. Seriously? So, I put my stuff down and walk over. She is getting stuff out of her wallet and asking me to call a family member. I ask if she has a phone number and she hands me a piece of paper, with an address. Being creative, I hand it back, tell her to hold on and look her up in the computer. I get a number and take it to her. She nods yes, so I call and leave a message. I go back and let her know that no one was home and I left a message.

I continue on with getting caught up and I look up later and whispers is gone. I have cleared out some of my rooms and see I have a new patient. Grab the chart and enter the room.

Low and behold it is….holy hell….it is whispers. I envision myself beating my head into the wall. Instead, I put on a smile and enter the room. For the sake of making this post shorter, just picture taking a medical history.

My time with whispers consists of the following:

1. Being asked every 10 minutes for something to drink
2. Having the tech ask me why the woman can not go to the bathroom…all she is doing is pointing
3. Having her ask another nurse if she can have another bottle of CT contrast
4. After whispering for hours, starts yelling because someone has not been in her room for 10 minutes. When I walk in, she proceeds to yell at me saying that she can not breathe. I explain that she can breathe or she would not be yelling at me. She continues to yell that she can not breathe.
5. Telling the Doc she wants to leave AMA because we will not give her “pop”. Doc allows something to drink and she agrees to wait long enough to get the CT scan.
6. Wants me to give her more medicine in her IV line, because it helped her breathe. The breathing medicine was morphine that the doc ordered for her stomach pain.
7. Asking for something to eat even though her complaint was that she had abdominal pain and had been vomiting. Although she did not vomit the whole time she was there.

Finally, I got moved to another area and had to pass her on to someone else. As I was packing up, the new tech was coming out of whispers’ room saying “Can she leave? She said the doctor said she can go……and she is pointing at a cup”