hissy fit

i am 30 years old. but i threw a 13 year old hissy fit yesterday at work. i think it was justified. don't all 13 year old girls?

in all honesty though, it was a legitimate complaint. the charge nurse of the day was a man; he very infrequently does charge. in my opinion, he's a lousy nurse, let alone a charge nurse. and because i believe a charge nurse flavors the day with his/her unique charm, attentiveness, and help, i anticipated that yesterday might be a little chaotic or less than smooth.

sure enough, at 11:30, after a leisurely morning with relatively simple patients, the charge came to me to give me an unscheduled admission. without asking how my day has been going (which is his job) or if my patient load could be burdened by an additional patient, he gave me the patient's name and a brief synopsis of her needs. she was coming from the OR and would need chemotherapy. i begrudgingly took the admit after first asking if he had asked any other nurses on the unit if they could easily take an admit. his response was, "no, you're the first." to which i responded, "why did you choose me?"

now, know that i rarely talk back to people in positions of power. i respect my elders and most of our charge nurses. but for some reason, i was feeling obstinate. his response irritated me even more; my blood pressure rose to dangerous levels. "i think you're the only nurse qualified to give chemotherapy," was his reply. i work on an oncology unit. did he seriously think i was the only chemo certified nurse. as a charge nurse, his job is to know every one's competencies and skills. turns out, more than 4 other nurses were qualified to give chemo. i pointed out the fact and snottily asked if he had taken that into consideration; he said no.

so, by now, i was making him uncomfortable. i was questioning his skill and his role as charge nurse. i wasn't refusing to take the admission. in fact, i admittedly acknowledged that i was NOT having a busy day and that i COULD tolerate a third patient, i always can. but that wasn't my point. my point was, i ALWAYS get asked to take admissions. i often have three patients. as a capable and rather relaxed nurse, i get my job done in a timely fashion and appear calm more often that not. but it's annoying and i would argue, unfair, to give the good nurse the hard patients, the admits, and difficult families - simply because they CAN do the job and do it well. how are the other nurses - the nurses who cannot handle three patients, or the nurses who have no time management skills - ever going to learn when i pick up their slack.

fifteen minutes later (the admission hadn't arrived to the unit yet), the charge nurse called me. he said, "good news. you don't have to take the admit. another nurse is discharging her patient and will be down to just one patient." great. no admit for me. but what almost irritated me more was, if indeed he had been a good charge nurse, he would have been attuned to the patients on the floor and known from the very beginning that a discharge was taking place and that a nurse, other than myself, would have been able to take an admission.

the funny part of the day... three more patients were admitted yesterday. all of them were unplanned. i could have taken any one of them. my afternoon was slow. but, because i had stuck up for myself, or maybe because i scared him, the charge nurse didn't ask me. everyone else got admits and i enjoyed a relaxed afternoon!