It’s an awful system we have (I work in it). It’s far too often cold and impersonal - and has sterile rooms with no windows. I’m sorry you’re going through this.
Thanks, Butch. I appreciate your empathy. I am OK---a bunch of bulging discs, but the man in the waiting room---death sentence----and sooner or later, all of us will have that experience in some way. If you ---in the system---can do what you can to provide caring in the time of deep need, that would be the best.
I’m a nurse anesthesiologist. I always try to spend even just a couple of extra minutes with patients who are with me because of something really serious. I’m a cancer survivor myself, and I know what it’s like to get that diagnosis and to lie in an ICU bed not knowing anything about what’s going on. Simply holding someone’s had and telling them that I’ve experienced some of what they’re going through will often completely change their affect. They’re still terrified of course, but just a brief moment of direct human contact on a deeper level than just cold clinical facts can really change the mood. I try to use humor when I feel like it will help (the medicine I’m about to give you is going to make me much better looking, and my jokes much funnier!). It makes my heart fairly burst when I can connect with a patient on that level, and help make their experience just a little less terrifying and awful.
Such an insightful post. It made me reflect on the ER I was in Wednesday evening. Not for myself, but it was the entrance to the hospital. The ER was moderately occupied, but, as you so eloquently said, with those alone, in a sterile room. I started thinking about my own future...sigh.
It’s an awful system we have (I work in it). It’s far too often cold and impersonal - and has sterile rooms with no windows. I’m sorry you’re going through this.
Thanks, Butch. I appreciate your empathy. I am OK---a bunch of bulging discs, but the man in the waiting room---death sentence----and sooner or later, all of us will have that experience in some way. If you ---in the system---can do what you can to provide caring in the time of deep need, that would be the best.
I’m a nurse anesthesiologist. I always try to spend even just a couple of extra minutes with patients who are with me because of something really serious. I’m a cancer survivor myself, and I know what it’s like to get that diagnosis and to lie in an ICU bed not knowing anything about what’s going on. Simply holding someone’s had and telling them that I’ve experienced some of what they’re going through will often completely change their affect. They’re still terrified of course, but just a brief moment of direct human contact on a deeper level than just cold clinical facts can really change the mood. I try to use humor when I feel like it will help (the medicine I’m about to give you is going to make me much better looking, and my jokes much funnier!). It makes my heart fairly burst when I can connect with a patient on that level, and help make their experience just a little less terrifying and awful.
You are one of the wise ones-----I know your patients feel your oneness with them in their time of great anxiety and change. Keep on, my friend!
Hang in there. You choose your fate from the facts presented.
Such an insightful post. It made me reflect on the ER I was in Wednesday evening. Not for myself, but it was the entrance to the hospital. The ER was moderately occupied, but, as you so eloquently said, with those alone, in a sterile room. I started thinking about my own future...sigh.