Me

The hospital where I work has all sorts of issues. There is a nursing shortage, there are problems with long waits, patients holding in the ED waiting for space on the floor that isn’t available due to a shortage of nurses. Turnover has been enough of an issue that they can’t keep staff.

There have been multiple administrators that have come and gone, and each of them has addressed it in a different way. One way was hiring contract nurses at $200 or more an hour. That was too expensive. Another administrator tried paying large bonuses to get nurses to work more days per week. Still another tried bringing in foreign workers.

One thing that all of them have had in common was the dumbest, least effective action. They changed the colors of the scrubs everyone wears. When I was hired, you could wear any color except black, denim, camouflage, or pediatric prints. Six months later, the colors changed. Since then, we have cycled through at least four different colors. In less than two years, I have bought at least five different collections of scrubs.

Effective tonight at midnight, we all have to wear a new scrub color. These scrubs have to be embroidered with the logo of the hospital and your job title “Nurse,” or “Doctor,” or what have you. We have to buy them from one approved vendor. That vendor is owned by the wife of one of the administrators. I am not sure how that is legal, but there it is.

So I had to buy two sets of scrubs in the new color, complete with the logo of the hospital affixed to it. I’ve learned not to buy more than that, because we will just have to buy a new color within a few months anyway.

The managers are mostly assholes and treat staff rather poorly, although I can say that I like the ones in charge of the ED. They are mostly cool, and I don’t blame them for my recent suspension. That came from risk management, and wasn’t their decision. Still, this place has begun getting on my nerves.

I am giving serious thought to switching hospitals. I’ve been here for two years now, and one of the nice things about this profession is the ease of finding a job. I know one nurse who shows up to interviews in casual clothes and says something to the effect of “Here is my license. We both know that you need nurses badly enough that you are going to offer me this job. So let’s cut to the chase- what are you willing to offer me? Don’t waste my time with useless back and forth, give me your best offer,” and they present her with her options.

Maybe it’s time for a change of scenery. There are a couple of options:

• I can go back to being full time. There are a couple of places that are offering $10k bonuses and more per hour than I currently make for full time, which is three shifts a week. The downside is I am on a fixed schedule, and I hate begging someone for time off.
• There is also an offer of $7500 bonuses at a couple of places. The downside is that I have to work two shifts a week, and still have to beg for time off.
• I can also take what’s called a seasonal position, which pays $65 to $85 an hour, depending on what unit you wind up in. The downside is that you get you no bonuses, no benefits, no shift differential, and have to work every holiday. You sign a contract that has to be renewed every six months, so you can take a few weeks off (without pay) between contracts.
• Or I can look and see what PRN contracts there are and at what pay level. These allow the most freedom- you generally have to work 4 days per month, but can work as much and whenever you like. The only benefits you get are shift differential, shift bonuses (which most hospitals have done away with), and the freedom to work whenever, as little, or as much as you want.
• The last option is travel. A recruiter just contacted me about working in Boston. Ten weeks, $3400 a week for three days per week. They pay the cost of your hotel. That works out to about $90 an hour. It costs $200 round trip to fly between Boston and Orlando, so I would be making $3200 a week for ten weeks but would have to pay Massachusetts taxes, plus would have to actually go to Massachusetts. I don’t think that’s in the cards for me.

I think I am looking at leaving this place in June or so, when my wife’s school year ends. I don’t need benefits, because I get health insurance from my wife’s job. Maybe I will take a month or so off, then look at my options.

Christmas day saw me work 13 hours in the emergency department. It was a fairly quiet day. Then came the 26th. Things were pretty quiet until 3 in the afternoon or so, then all hell broke loose. We had drunks and crazies galore.

One guy came in as a Baker Act*. He was screaming that he was a CIA trained assassin and said he was going to kill (pointing at four of us, me included) those guys as soon as EMS let him off the stretcher. My manager was standing next to me. The same manager that had to tell me that I had been suspended for the last time I had to wrestle a patient. Next to that manager were two of our doctors.

Sotto voce (so the patient couldn’t hear) I said, “How good of an assassin could you be? Killing yourself even seemed to be beyond your capabilities.” Coffee immediately shot out of the doctor’s nose. My manager said, so let’s let him off the stretcher and see what happens. I said, “Do you really want to do that? Last time that shit happened, you suspended me for a week.” The manager even laughed. We gave him some Haldol and some Benadryl, which did wonders for his attitude. After an hour or so, he was telling me that I was the smartest man he had ever met. Love that Haldol.

We also worked four codes, some other kidney and blood sugar problems, half a dozen sepsis alerts, and a stroke alert or two. We are also seeing a lot of flu and COVID. We actually had our first COVID death in quite a while. It was legit. He came in complaining of shortness of breath and had an O2 saturation of 65% and a blood pressure of 70/40. We did all we could, and even managed to get his O2 up into the 90’s with some BIPAP, but even Levophed couldn’t keep his BP up. He died about an hour after we sent him upstairs to the ICU.

Yesterday was no better. We had all sorts of craziness. A homeless woman who wanted to fight, three codes, and a dislocated hip. Conscious sedation, one nurse leaning on his pelvis, me pushing on the hip joint, and the doctor up on the bed with the patient’s knee on his shoulder, pulling. We pulled several times, then a loud pop. Nope, didn’t realign. Instead, the hip fractured. So now he’s off to ortho for surgery. Another patient had been prescribed Januvia and Novolog and the combination meant that we couldn’t keep her blood sugar up without a constant D10 drip.

Thus ends my work year for 2022. Now I don’t work again until a few days into 2023. I worked 38 hours in three days, which is why there hasn’t been any posting here to speak of.

A Baker Act is a law in Florida that says a person can be held under involuntary psychiatric observation for up to 72 hours, if a Law Enforcement Officer or Physician feels that the person presents an immediate threat of death or serious bodily harm to themselves or others. It’s generally used when a person either attempts or threatens suicide. Every state in the US has a similar law.

Although I confess that I am an atheist, I have much in common with those of the Christian religion. Nearly all of the values that are prized by those of faith: honesty, family, forgiveness, duty, honor, I share with you. Each of those values are ideals that we can hang on to during the times that are here, and through the tougher times that are coming. It is through our love of each other that we will be able to get through the times to come.

It is during this, the holiest of the holidays of the Christian faith, that we pause to reflect on our lives and the things that we hold dear. We need to be with family and cherish those who are most important to us. I have spent time this Christmas with my wife, my daughter, and my grandchildren. My life is going well, financially, romantically, and otherwise. I have much to be thankful for, and I am in a better position that the vast majority of humanity. I have a wife who loves me, a roof over my head, and I am not worried about whether or not I will be able to eat today. For just those simple things, I am better off than the majority of humanity.

Here is my hope to all of you that you find yourselves just as blessed, just as happy. Spend today with your families and enjoy the time that you have together, for there will come a time when that is no longer the case. Love those close to you. Spend time. Make memories.

Most of all, have a Merry Christmas. Even if you aren’t a Christian. Take a day off from worrying about the state of the world, our country, and just worry about yourself and your family. The world of worry will still be there waiting tomorrow. Until then, let’s hope for at least one more day of peace on Earth and goodwill towards our fellow man.

I was originally going to take a few days off, but felt the need to report this. Until this morning, I was the subject of a criminal and work related investigation. I have been suspended without pay for the past week. I got the call this morning and have been cleared of all wrongdoing, just in time to return to work on Christmas Day.

I was at work a week and a half ago. Another nurse asked me to accompany her and a female technician into a patient’s room because he had been giving her some problems. I went into the room behind them, and the patient began referring to the technician as his wife. Then he accused the EMS personnel of laughing at him while they were trying to initiate an affair with his wife. Standing at his bedside, I told him that no one was making fun of him. He yelled, “You all are!” then tried getting out of bed. I touched his arm and told him to calm down. That’s when he grabbed me and tried pulling my arm to his mouth in order to bite me.

I put him in a wrist lock with one hand, then pressed on his parotid gland with the other, which forced his face into the pillow. He started kicking me and calling me a “punk ass bitch” and saying that he was a retired NYC police officer, and that he would find me on the street and “fucking kill” me.

He later contacted my employer and the police and attempted to file charges against me for battery.

The investigations took 9 days. My employer has suggested that I file counter charges, but since he was delusional, the police said any such charges would go nowhere. My employer told me that they were worried that since he was a retired cop that the local cops would take his side. I explained to him that the local cops don’t like NY cops because they constantly come down here and call the local cops a bunch of hicks and tell them how much better NYPD is.

At any rate, I can now return to work, just in time for Christmas day. At least I will get time and a half plus critical shortage bonus. ( Remember the critical needs bonuses that they cancelled back in September? They reinstated them three weeks ago, because they can’t get anyone to come to work without them.)

I called in sick today. They want me to report to employee health for a COVID test. Note that when I actually DID have COVID back in May, no one gave a shit, as long as I came in to work.

Fever finally broke at about 4 am. I woke up, covered in sweat to the point where my shirt and the sheets under me were soaked. Now I just have a bit of congestion and my body feels like I went a few rounds against a heavyweight boxer. Still, it’s an improvement…

This particular virus, whatever it is, is much worse than either of my two earlier bouts with COVID. I never had a fever with COVID when I had it before. Right now, we are seeing lots of cases of the Flu in the ED, more than we are COVID, and that may be what this is. Still can’t smell anything, but that may be due to the congestion and not the infection.

Back to bed…

It started Sunday. I had no appetite, was tired, had a tickle in my throat and a cough. Monday, I woke up with chills and had aches all over. I went to bed with a 100.5 fever. Now my temp is 101.2 and I can’t smell anything. Even though the COVID test I just took is negative, here comes my HCQ, Calcium, Ivermectin.

So no posting until I can get out of bed. If this is COVID, that’s the third time this year.

Working in medicine means going to school. Forever.

Today was final exams day. Glad that’s over.