The ugly side of Frequent Flying:

[jrittenhouse]

The staff here at the hospital are very nice, but the number of them that have recognized me from earlier visits, most recently the one in July, is rather upsetting. I always try to behave genteelly in a hospital; I figure that the staff has plenty of crap to deal with, and it would be a sin to pile more on them for no good reason.

No, my

Comments

[quietdarkness]

Jim, speaking from experience, we like our frequent flyers on my unit. They become like family to us over time. I know you don't want to be one, but there are advantages to going to a place over and over. They know your history, you know your likes and your dislikes.You also get special treatment, because you know, you're family.

It is your right and duty as a patient to question your nurse about the things that don't seem right to you, or if there's something new you don't understand. It's a nurse's job to know why she or he is either a)doing a treatment or b)giving you a medication. If I am to give a drug I am unfamiliar with, I look it up before I go into the patient's room. Some don't, but they should. If questioned, they should be willing to go outside and look it up and come back to you with the information so you can make a judgment on if you will take it or not.

So keep advocating for yourself. That's what I expect from my patients and your nurses should expect it too. It actually saves us in the long run from making errors

[salexa]

Working where I do I get a chance to see some of the scary stuff doctors do and talking to them I get a sense of what they don't know. Keep advocating for yourself... you know you better than any single doctor out there can.