Since I have started working at UK, I have had many unique and interesting patients. However, over the past four months, I have had this patient that has managed to bring about so many feelings and emotions for me. He is definitely what would be considered a “frequent flyer” (yes those really do exist). He is also a difficult patient to care for. In fact when most nurses hear his name…they shudder and pray that they will not be the nurse to care for him. He is a difficult patient, for sure, but at the same time, I think he has become one of my favorite patients.
If this patient had a talent it would be to cause emotional rollercoasters for his nurses. One second I feel sorry for him since he is a little pathetic (and he can look at you with his puppy dog eyes and there is no telling him no) and in the next I want to drug him up because he can be the most annoying person on the planet…especially since he knows my name so all night I hear… “ALICIA…ALICIA…ALICIA…ALICIA! ALICIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” Let me tell you…it makes for a very long night…
But I just can’t help but feel sorry for the guy…I mean he’s in the hospital in excruciating pain (or at least that’s what he wants me to believe)…with an unidentifiable stage pressure ulcer on his coccyx…so yeah he’s kind of easy to feel sorry for…
Especially when you consider that most of the other nurses do not treat him very well..They see him as more of a laughing stock and a good joke then the human being that he is. They spend their time laughing at him because his mental status is not at the same level as theirs…
Enough ranting about that…I have spent quite a bit of time with this patient in caring for him and trying to calm him down…and we become what he likes to call “buddies” and “she’s the best nurse in the world and she’s my favorite”…surprisingly when you spend time with him and talk to him while you are doing your care you find that he is such a sweet guy who is scared and lonely…
One night he was very upset and would not calm down no matter what I did…so the 45 minutes of torture for the dressing change of his multiple wounds, seemed like forever…while I was talking and distracting him from the pain, I learned that he doesn’t watch much television, but he does listen to the radio a lot and he is a huge country music fan. With this I had a thought.
The next day, I went out and got a cheap radio and took it to the hospital for him. The joy and excitement on his face was priceless. When I turned the radio on, he began to sway to the music and fell asleep (this is a miracle in itself since he almost never sleeps).
That radio became his calming method and any time the music was on, he was much calmer and less likely to call out. Every time I visited or cared for him after this…he would thank me profusely “I love my radio…you are the bestest friend ever…I love my radio I just love my radio”.
From that moment on…I remembered why I had become a nurse…believe it or not it is not for the paycheck or for the benefits or any other reason than for seeing that smile on his face and knowing that I had made a difference in even one person’s life…and that I was there and willing to help in any way possible and that meant the world to someone. Even though I have tough nights and frustrating patients…I think I have the best job in the world…if only for moments like these.
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