If Nurses Aged in Reverse

“No—no!” shrieked my 95-year-old patient with dementia as I turned her to her side with the help of my nursing assistant (now called a patient care tech, 30 years later).

The three daughters sitting at her bedside inhaled deeply, their eyes wide. I looked over at them, calmly explaining that their mom was just frightened, and then in a soft voice said to my patient, “Don’t worry, Mrs. Smith, we won’t let you fall,” as she continued to scream. We positioned pillows against her back, and another between her knees. As we saw the family relax, and the patient’s screams turn to a barely audible whimper, I caressed her back and felt satisfied that all was well.

Fast-forward to my retirement. Having inherited my parents’ degenerative joint disease, at age 72 I have certain specific ways to sleep so that my left shoulder doesn’t hurt, my left hip bursitis doesn’t flare, and my right arm doesn’t get numb and tingly from a pillow that’s too puffy, causing hyperflexion of my cervical vertebrae.

Never assume what the patient’s feeling.

I have flashbacks from the days I thought I was an efficient nurse—I dread having someone, someday, assume that I am just frightened in their attempts to keep me on a turning schedule to prevent pressure ulcers. While […]

2021-08-30T14:19:59-04:00August 30th, 2021|patient experience, Patients|1 Comment
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Joy, Relief, Reverence: Positive Side Effects of a First COVID-19 Vaccination

A family’s long year, brushed by COVID-19.

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

On February 23, 2020, three days before a flight to Israel to speak at a nursing conference, I received a message from the host that the ministry of health had issued a restriction to stop all conferences and meetings in the health care system because of the coronavirus. I had other business scheduled, so I boarded the flight. While in Israel, I followed the global health news, and returned home a week later fully aware that COVID-19 was an emerging pandemic. But when I landed and entered the international arrivals terminal at Newark Airport, business was as usual and only a handful of us in line wore masks going through customs.

It’s been a hard year since that time. My son, a healthy 27-year-old, had COVID in late March, during the worst surge of positive cases and deaths in New York City. Testing wasn’t available. He lived a subway ride away. For 10 days, I monitored his symptoms by texts, along with his primary care provider. He fully recovered. My 95-year-old mother died in April in a  New York State assisted living facility. We don’t believe her death was COVID related. Restrictions prevented my visiting her for […]

2021-02-26T09:33:01-05:00February 26th, 2021|COVID-19, infection control, Nursing, patient experience, Public health|3 Comments
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How Do You Feel When Your Patients Can’t Afford Care?

“Every day in the United States, nurses watch patients forgo beneficial treatment they cannot afford despite nursing’s moral standard to treat patients without regard to financial condition.”

How often have you been left, pretty much on your own, to figure out a way that your uninsured and/or homeless patients have access to something (anything!) that will maintain their health when you aren’t with them? Are there meds they can’t pay for? Do they need prenatal care that they can’t afford? Can they possibly function without home care of some kind?

Moral distress as a call to seek systemic change.

In “Ethical Issues: The Moral Distress of Nurses When Patients Forgo Treatment Because of Cost” in this month’s AJN (free to access until October 7), Douglas Olsen and Linda Keilman discuss the moral distress of nurses when we are unable to meet the needs of patients who don’t have the money to pay for care in our for-profit health care system. […]

2020-09-17T07:03:34-04:00September 17th, 2020|health care policy, Nursing, nursing perspective, patient experience, Patients, Public health|0 Comments
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Time Matters, Priorities Change: A Nurse and Cancer Survivor on Living with the Pandemic

Everything is different, and the same.

Michael Himbeault/Wikimedia Commons

It’s going to be a while before things get to normal, if they ever do. It’s more like the future will become the normal.

The only thing in my experience I can liken it to is my cancer survivorship: you start living your life again, but everything is different. Priorities change. Your sense of safety never fully returns, yet because of this you become more purposeful in living: time matters. It’s as though you go on living, but learn a new way to do it.

There’s actually a sense of freedom accompanying the realization that nothing/no one lasts forever.

Finding a middle ground.

After I completed treatment, I watched the Jeff Bridges film Fearless (1993). His character is a survivor of a horrendous airliner crash, and he develops a sense of invincibility as a way of coping. I understood his character really well. You either hide in fear, or you go forward as if you are invincible. Eventually, you discover a middle ground. […]

2020-05-27T10:26:29-04:00May 27th, 2020|infectious diseases, Nursing, patient experience, Public health, wellness|0 Comments
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How Can We Improve the Hospital Experience of Visually Impaired Patients?

VIP Care Toolbox used in QI project

“Hello, I’m your nurse, Jane. Are you able to see me clearly?”

I have trouble functioning without a pair of eyeglasses within reach. If I were in the hospital without my glasses, I’d be at a loss—unable to read for pleasure, let alone read menus or instructions or consent forms. How much harder is it for people with moderate vision loss, or those who are totally blind?

Christine Carlson and her colleagues at St. David’s North Austin Medical Center in Austin, Texas, set out to answer this question. They met with visually impaired people in the community, reviewed the literature, and surveyed their own staff in order to learn the best ways to accommodate the unique needs of visually impaired patients, or ‘VIPs.’

In “Caring for Visually Impaired Patients in the Hospital: A Multidisciplinary Quality Improvement Project” in the May issue of AJN, the authors highlight how frightening and frustrating a hospitalization can be for those with limited or no sight, and share simple, practical interventions that can make an enormous difference in the safety and quality of a VIP’s hospital experience.

“I’m always afraid to go to the hospital. They don’t know what […]

2020-05-21T09:52:23-04:00May 21st, 2020|patient experience, Patients|0 Comments
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Views expressed on the blog are solely those of the authors or persons quoted. They do not necessarily reflect AJN’s views or those of Wolters Kluwer Health/Lippincott Williams and Wilkins.
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