Sunday, March 1, 2009

A funny thing happened...

So, the other day I was sitting at my desk at work....now I know most of you know I do not have a desk job...but last week I did. I must say I do not know how people can sit all day, kudos to you if you can and not want to rip your back apart at the end of the week. Anywho, I was sitting at my desk in our outpatient pharmacy. My job was to intake prescriptions and let patients know how long their wait would be. Now, this is the perfect time to clear something up for those of you who are wondering why it takes so long when you go into the pharmacy. We do not as you may think, take your prescription grab a bottle off of the shelf and "slap a label on it". I can't tell you how many times I have heard this. It does take time to input the prescription, decipher the doctor's writing, bill the insurance, fill the order and have a pharmacist verify that you are indeed getting the antibiotic prescribed and not some sort of hormone pills. Anyways, that is a long story for another day.
I was sitting at my desk typing away when I looked out into the lobby. Our lobby is shared with the transplant clinic which is across the hall. This last week the lobby was full to quite full ALL week. As I looked out at the chairs about 15 feet away from me I saw a man who didn't look too good. His wife was sitting with him and a couple of nurses were asking him questions like "do you know your name?", "what street do you live on?" and "do you find it annoying that I am asking you these questions?"...anyways he was responding and they were giving him some V8 and crackers to try and get some food in his system. Next thing I know, he is completely passed out in his chair, and falling to the floor. There is all of a sudden a plethora of nurses around him with the crash cart and they are all working together to bring him back. I see all of these machines, they are talking to him and one nurse is taking his pulse. They are for the most part calm as I am sure this is a daily occurrence. One nurse starts to poke him in the arm for some reason as if she was going to take blood. A few minutes later the man opens his eyes, looks over at that very nurse and says "what your doing, hurts like hell!". She is turn says "you really scared us there, we're just trying to help you." He says, "I understand that, I just want you to know, what you're doing hurts like hell."
Now, please understand that I do not find it funny that this man has passed out. I feel so much sympathy for what I can't even imagine he has been through or will go through as a result of his transplant. I just love his reaction upon coming to. The nurses I am sure have dealt with some pretty scary situations but I know if I were the one he would have said that to...I would have burst into tears. Sometimes being a nurse can be a thankless job and I just want to say to all of the nurses out there....thank you for what you do, even if it hurts like hell!

1 comment:

nathanjohnson83 said...

Abs thanks for this story, that was a pretty funny response. you might want to ad dentists to the list of people that do things to you that are probably good, but hurt like hell.