Code Blue on the floor: a lot like a Code Blue in the Emergency Department, except we have to run to the elevators, take a ponderously slow ride up to whatever floor they’re doing compressions, and then run some more down some endlessly long corridors till we find a room
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Those Emergency Blues: Portraits of Nurses at War
A small selection of photographs from the National Archives of Canada. Nurses have served with the Canadian military since Northwest Rebellion in 1885 and small contingents were sent to the South African War — the Boer War — at the turn of the last century. Nurses became an official part of
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Sleepy Sleepy Nurse
MY EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT COLLEAGUES are a youngish group as a whole, compared to me, that is, and most of them have school-aged children. A subset of this group of have traded shifts so they’re substantially working a straight night shift line,* in order to attend to family obligations. Almost all
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Those Emergency Blahs
I’ve worked as an Emergency Department nurse for something like thirteen years now, and at my present position more or less for ten years. It’s probably safe to say I’ve seen just about everything from the incredible tragic to the incredible funny, the good, the bizarre and the ugly. As
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Why Physicians Should Care about Amanda Trujillo
[This post appeared last week, in slightly modified form, at KevinMd.com. Nice to see it’s generating a huge response and vigorous debate there. TE.] For the past month, the case of Amanda Trujillo has resonated deeply among nurses, triggering an avalanche of postings on Facebook, Twitter and in the nursing blogosphere.
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Insert Snark Here
What this patient did not have Mr. CD, 88, took a little tumble at the nursing home when he slipped on a loose rug (or something, the details are a little vague here), obtained for his trouble a scalp laceration the length of Q-tip on his temple, bled like a
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: TV Series Hot
Gob-smacklingly stupid or hip advertising? I’m leaning towards the former. Via CBC: A Stockholm hospital that published an online ad looking to fill a summer position with a nurse who is “TV-series hot” says it was “written to catch people’s attention.” “We want people to be curious and have a
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Doctors Are From Mars, Nurses Are From — Oh, To Hell With It
News flash! From Fierce Medical News, here’s the shocking headline: Docs, nurses miscommunicate on respect, job role When you guys pick yourselves off the floor from laughing, here’s the money quote: In particular, the survey found differing views of how doctors treat nurses. According to 42 percent of nurse leaders,
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: A Nasty, Medically Unnecessary, Coercive Procedure
This is just grostesque: A Republican supermajority has muscled two of the most restrictive anti-abortion bills in years through the Virginia House, despite bitter yet futile objections from Democrats, with one GOP delegate deriding most of the procedures as “matters of lifestyle convenience.” You want to put what where? [SNIP]
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Nurses are Like Howler Monkeys, Poo and All
When I was a young, inexperienced nurse, I quickly learned one lesson: the cliché that Emergency nurses are fabulously assertive, mouthy, in-your-face pitbulls is absolutely true. I don’t mean ED nurses are bitchy or backstabbing eat-their-own-young types, though this was true also, at least for some of them. I mean
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Another One Bites the Dust
Via White Coat’s Call Rooom, I wanted to mention the demise of Weird Nursing Tales: After nearly 20 years on the internet, Weird Nursing Tales passed away. Weird Nursing Tales died on February 7, 2012 after it was reported to Administration that the true author was an employee of the
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Observations and Assessments
Notions to small for a blog post, all in one place, a.k.a. the periodic link dump. Giving all aid short of actual help. First, some words from the American Nurses Association on Amanda Trujillo. The ANA finallyissued a news release, in which they absolutely avoided, like nervous grannies dithering over
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Why Nurses are Furious about the Amanda Trujillo Case
The case of Amanda Trujillo has generated a great deal of passionate commentary across the nursing blogosphere. Trujillo, as you may well know, is the nurse who was fired by Banner Health Del E. Webb Medical Center for requesting multi-disciplinary hospice care case management consult for a pre-transplant patient with end-stage
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: A Paean to ED Nurses or Just Annoying?
Twitter follower @camillelalonde — thank you — sent me this oldish link, which initially warmed the very cockles of my heart: Guest Editorial ACEP News September 2006 By David F. Baehren, M.D. [. . .] We usually look afar for heroes and role models, and in doing so overlook a group
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Long Emergency Department Admissions Shorten Lives
Via ImpactedNurse.com, another study showing prolonged emergency department stays are less than optimal: There were 41,256 admissions from the ED. Mortality generally increased with increasing boarding time, from 2.5% in patients boarded less than 2 hours to 4.5% in patients boarding 12 hours or more (p < 0.001). Mean hospital
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: A Little Nurse Bashing to Start Your Day
For breakfast, how about some outrageous libel from physician-blogger Terry Simpson (Twitter: @DocSimpson). File this under how not to blog about a serious issue in health care: The Arizona State Nursing board has asked that this nurse [Amanda Trujillo] undergo a psychiatric evaluation. The board is charged with protecting the
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Bedside Nursing as Menial and Demeaning
Ian Miller, blogging over at ImpactedNurse.com, notes a disturbing trend in Australia, one, I’m afraid, is becoming more common in North America. “These days,” he writes, “being a nurse is tough. Really tough.” I look around and see many struggling at the bedside. I see the increasing perception that this
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: What the Amanda Trujillo Case Tells Me About Nurses Behaving Badly
Amanda Trujillo can take cold comfort that her situation is not unique. In the two years and odd months I have posted on this blog, I have written about six other cases where nurses (or nursing students) have been bullied and hounded: the nurse whose hospital fired her for mouthing off
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: Voices For Amanda Trujillo
Each of them eloquently speaks to the heart of what we do as nurses — and why nurses find how Amanda Trujillo was fired and subsequently reported to the Arizona State Board of Nursing so troubling. (Via The Innovative Nurse.) The first is from Andrew Lopez (Twitter: @nursefriendly.) Kevin Ross
Continue readingThose Emergency Blues: A Small Rant from Your Friendly X-ray Tech
A note sent to me from my favourite MRT (Medical Radiation Technologist). A reminder too, that nurses aren’t the centre of the universe, even if we think we are. Some thoughts from an MRT. . . Now I know we aren’t perfect but I feel like a rant about portable
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