After I read an online news account of a woman who was lying in the floor for hours in a U.S. hospital before she finally died, I could not help but look back on my own short, would-have-been nursing career. Sadly, it is actually easy for me to believe that negligence such as this occurs on a daily basis only we don't read about it on a daily basis. You might ask why I find something as horrid as leaving a woman in the floor to die…believable. I'm reminded of “apples don't fall far from the tree” or the Biblical passage of “you are known by your fruits,” to name a couple of thought provoking sayings. Institutions of higher learning train in such a way that results in like minded professionals who conform to accepted standards of practice that prioritize cost efficient measures in the workplace.
Conforming to Survive a Nursing Career
If you have ever wondered why there is a nursing shortage in the U. S., it is just as it appears. Nurses who genuinely care for patients and put patients' needs ahead of every other agenda in hospitals might never survive a career of nursing. I found that I could not survive the nursing school environment and I actually am now able to examine the reasons objectively after recalling events of some of the nursing classes, labs and clinicals in which I participated. Receiving acceptable grades was usually not a problem for me. My problems arose in not being able to take on what I saw as false documentation, deception, and fraud that I would have to accept in order to be successful while working in a hospital environment. Keeping my mouth shut would have been mandatory for me to achieve the joy of success.
Attempts at Being Cost Effective Actually Costs?
Since my only reason for attending nursing school at an age older than most of the other students was to be of noble service to the ill and miserable while earning a respectable living in the process, what I witnessed in nursing school and also in a hospital was startling. I saw nursing assistants document false vital signs, with the knowledge of the nurses in charge, because they did not have time or did not want to take time to accurately check and record the signs that are measured and considered vital to life. With nosocomial or hospital acquired infections rapidly on the rise, I found dried fecal matter on bed linens that were thought to be clean or sterile. Common sense appeared to have flown out the window as patients' blood pressure, temperature and oxygen levels were measured via the same equipment that was transported from room to room without taking time to disinfect after each patient. Why is it not mandatory for all patients to receive their own thermometers and other devices to use, then take home or disposed of afterwards? Why are disinfectant wipes only given to patients who are thought to be infected with highly contagious staph infections, MRSA, or some other dreaded diseases since all patients who are admitted to a hospital are susceptible of acquiring these diseases? When I asked my clinical instructor these questions, I was told that to do so was not cost efficient and then I was given an unsatisfactory grade for a clinical day with events totally fabricated by her lies. To this day, I think that it would be more cost efficient to prevent some of these diseases than to treat them after patients become ill.
Nonconformists to Accepted Cost Efficient Measures Nipped in the Bud
Then I read the news account online about the patient who was left to die on the floor in a hospital and my first thought was, maybe to some medical personnel who analyzed the situation, neglecting the patient may have been more cost efficient. Had nursing assistants I worked with in a hospital taken time they needed to accurately check and record vital signs, more assistants would have to be hired…certainly not cost efficient, some might think. But is our attempt at being cost efficient actually costing more money and lives? When I started to notice that some of my answers in my nursing classes had been tampered with or changed to reflect a different answer than I had given, I went to my instructor, then I went to the Nursing Department Chairman, thinking that honesty would prevail. What I found in this particular nursing program and also the reason I withdrew from the nursing program was that nursing students like me who question accepted cost efficient methods or who question those in authority for how they grade tests or evaluate students find themselves unsuccessful in attempts at pursuing a nursing career. Perhaps it is considered to be more cost efficient to nip in the bud would be nurses who fail to conform to accepted cost efficient measures.
Real Reason for Nursing Shortage Needs to be Addressed
A lesson I obviously failed to learn which was most likely the root of my failure while studying nursing was that false documentation is widely accepted and would become a part of my day to day activities when I became successful as a nurse. Another lesson that I obviously did learn and was instilled deeply while attending nursing school is that sometimes a situation is just as it appears…there is a real reason for the nursing shortage and that real reason needs to be addressed before U.S. healthcare is no longer affordable… or desirable.
