5 West Nursing

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last century, I’m sure you’ve seen at least one movie in your lifetime. That being said, we all know that what we see on the big screen is a culmination of weeks, even months, of hard work by a group of people who came together to create that spectacle we call a movie.

Unfortunately for those who worked behind the scenes, all the audience remembers are the people who had the leading role. What most people don’t realize is that, these so called movie stars wouldn’t exist if nobody put them on a pedestal. And although looks and talent may be a big factor in their rise to stardom, it is their fans and the people behind them that makes them look good, an important ingredient to achieving celebrity status.

In the field of healthcare, you can say that the “stars” of the show are nurses. I’m not saying that because I am one, but rather, because it is the way it is. At the end of the shift it is the nurse that gets remembered by the patient, just like a movie goer would remember the star who had the leading role. And just like a movie goer who would judge the actor’s performance as excellent or poor, a patient also makes judgements about the nurses’ performance based on their experience with the nurse.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that the people who work in the background are trivial… far from it! In fact, it is the people in the background that make or break the performance. Just think about it for a minute…. You can have stunning special effects, but if the actors aren’t talented the scene starts to look phony. Or, you can have great action, but if the music sucks, the scene sucks. On that note, you can have a star nurse, but if the pharmacy doesn’t deliver that pain medication on time, what can your star nurse do? If xray takes 48 hours to get a report to the chart because it is the weekend, who is to blame? If a bloody dressing cannot be reinforced or changed because central supplies failed to stock the unit, would the patient have to wait till the next day?

Regardless of what department you work… don’t get fooled by the cliche, “we are here for the patient”. NO… the NURSE is here for the patient… you are here for the nurse! Hate the idea, but I believe this is reality. Each supporting department is here for the nurse… labs, pharmacy, xray, housekeeping, central supplies, dietary, information services, you name it. Without the cooperation and full support of these departments, the nursing department suffers, and subsequently, the patient suffers. 

I’m sure you work at a hospital where nurses are held in high esteem, where the nurses’ success is everyone’s success, where management treat nurses as assets instead of liabilities, and where departments work together to solve each other’s problems. But then again, it’s a dog eat dog world out there, and for the most part, nurses are fair game and oftentimes get the short end of the stick unlike movie stars who get the red carpet treatment for their life-saving performances… ya. At least as a nurse, I get to go to Walmart without the pesty paparazzi.