Oh, I'm a bad, bad nurse....
Lady in "b" bed (by the window) was pretty sick -- CHF/COPD/ESRF, in for COPD exacerbation, but we didn't think she was going to die that day by any means. Bed A is same day post op for an open chole, with significant MI history, and EF of about 30%. She's got her daughter and her hubby trying to stay with her in our postage stamp room and they've been nasty, demanding, and verbally abusive to everyone; B bed's alone. A bed actually told her nurse, "I want a private room, I don't want to share my room with a stinky old person."
Guess what happened in the middle of the night. Yup, I'm walking back from a 3 am protonix IV push, and meet 2 other nurses going "32, 32, go in 32 now!" Sure enough, B bed, who was thankfully a DNR, was passing. I'm listening for her heart beat, and trying to quietly tell the other nurses I'm not getting anything, and the unit secretary comes on the speaker and softly says, "asystole." We're all pretty sad, since B bed was a frequent flier (but a nice one) and we'd all taken care of her at some point. We're figure out how we're going to get the cadaver transporter into the room, since A bed, for all her witchiness, can't really be moved to a wheelchair and rolled into the hall, who's going to call the doc, who's going to prep the body, etc. Hubby pops around the curtain, demanding that we keep it down, since the "noise" the other patient has been making was keeping beloved wife awake. Oh, I'm a bad nurse....
I just said, "Well, sir, she won't be bothering your wife anymore, she just died."
No comments:
Post a Comment