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Thread: The Saddest Thing I Ever Had To Do

  1. #11
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    Re: The Saddest Thing I Ever Had To Do

    At my hospital we have an ethics committee number and a pt relations number I have been know to call when i felt the pt was not being treated right and I have provided pts with contact numbers to call themselves. Care coordinators tend to most of the details, but when it doesn't work, I believe pt advocacy is a very important part of our job. I know it is very different in different settings. However hospice or
    legal aide may be other resources. Do not feel bad about your role though. You did what you had to do at that time. I often wish I was independently wealthy then could just care for the pts that tug on yout heart at all times. Bet burnout would be much worse then. Make yourself remember the good things you hsve accomplished in proportion to the areas you did not have the time etc. available to tend as you so desired.

  2. #12
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    Re: The Saddest Thing I Ever Had To Do

    Santa on the screened in porch. God I love it. Your cool to be you. That really is CHRISTmas.

  3. #13
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    Re: The Saddest Thing I Ever Had To Do

    God help our Hospitals now before we all know exactly how you felt. I know of thw insane rush to discharge for bed turn overs. I pray we find answers before we get in more frequent situations that Hospitals choose who we help and who we discharge on a money msking criterea.

  4. #14
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    Re: The Saddest Thing I Ever Had To Do

    Judyd,
    We had an admissions staff make the comment that we couldn't block the other bed in our dying patient's room because they weren't dying fast enough. How do these people sleep?

  5. #15
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    Re: The Saddest Thing I Ever Had To Do

    But on the otherhand I had a pt dead over three hours before tne pronoucer resident got there to pronounce. This is the only place I ever worked that the policy was for the resident on call had to be called to pronounce. They shortened staff once and it was about 2 1/2 hours before we figured out how to get a transplant pt to a morge. Problems problems

  6. #16

    Re: The Saddest Thing I Ever Had To Do

    Hallrunner I feel the sadness and pain you had to feel having to deposit that poor fellow out in the rain and leave him that way. I have no platitudes to offer that will make the heartache go away or lessen but I do send you a warm compassionate hug through the miles via cyberspace.

    I can tell you're a good person with a large heart. It matters a great deal that this disturbed you! It tells you that you have the natural instincts of a great nurse. Now... only time can help you to cope with the copious mixture of good you accomplish on a daily basis- all the things you do that make someone's life better or bring comfort to others, along with the heartrending things we also have to contend with - and keep on going despite.

    You learn to do what you can, and do it the best that you can, and adjust the best you can to the fact that no matter how good you are you can't change certain things;

    You can't stop deaths- there will always be those patients you hate to see die but do nonetheless...

    You can't stop every act of violence, drug abuse, suicidal behaviour, or other intentional foolish thing people do to themselves or each other out there... you can educate and try to make a difference, but you will never cure the world of these ills...

    There will be poverty.. homelessness.. uninsured.. illegal aliens.. etc.. always.. You can do your best to try to find them food, shelter, treatment, social services and other help.. but you can only do what you can do.. there will always be poor.. you cannot fix the world's woes all by yourself..

    You do what you can do-- and what you do makes a huge differences to many many lives- every day. **HUG**

  7. #17

    Re: The Saddest Thing I Ever Had To Do

    As an aside...

    The saddest thing I ever had to do was care for a preemie in NICU that had severe congenital defects (born with no kidneys) and follow doctor's orders & parents wishes and basically torture that poor neonate until she died....

    The parents knew it was going to be born that way but because of religious reasons abortion was out of the question, so the mother delivered..

    Then.. also because of religious reasons.. they insisted on every single measure possible to extend the newborn's life.. everything. It was hell on earth for 3 days --
    That poor baby had a UAC, intubated, and got nuitrition via the UAC -- until even morphine couldn't still the baby's agony as it's abdomen swelled up nearly till bursting from the fluids it had no way to eliminate! Only after repeated pleading & begging the neonatologist did we convince him to disregard the parents wishes at long last & DC the UAC to stop putting more fluids into that baby..

    3 days of watching it suffer in unbearable anguish..
    and the parents would come pray over it-- while they caused it to die in agony... barf!!!

    There are some things we see.. we'll never forget..
    Hug more...

  8. #18
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    Re: The Saddest Thing I Ever Had To Do

    Thanks Medi,

    You've helped me a lot. I never get to hear stuff like that from anyone. No one has a clue what a nurse goes through except another nurse.

    Okay, something I once saw, when I was pretty new, which is opposite to your story, but really the same:

    They had a male patient who was a DNR. Someone goofed and resuscitated him (not me, someone else). The family was furious. So, to correct their mistake, the doctors ceased all nutrition and starved and dehydrated him to death.

    I particularly remember this patient because, for some reason I can't remember, he was beet red. I remember him as a round, red face with expressionless eyes but alert. He took a long time to die. It was horrible.

    The thing of it was, they were feeding him before, but after he unwisely made it through the code, the ethics committee chose starvation as a means to solve their unlawful life lawsuit problem.



  9. #19

    Re: The Saddest Thing I Ever Had To Do

    Hallrunner... reading about your experience and how that poor fellow had to die... just makes me wonder about the real "ethics" of our society. Sometimes-- Jack Kevorkian's method seems to make a lot more sense.

    At least a person would be given a choice about how they wanted to end their suffering. I don't mean like those crazies who take it on themselves to kill patients- lord no- but I do wonder if euthenasia may be more morally ethical than the laws we have that prevent people a means to end horrible suffering. Know what I mean?

    Opinions?? Anyone?

  10. #20
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    This may be an old thread, but anyone out there have something to add?

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