There's a woman who I know from the pool who works as a nurse in one of the ICUs. She's a little weird. I always feel like no matter how positive and friendly I am to her, she has something negative or disapproving to say to me.
Oh well. Her problem I suppose.
Anyway, the other week I ran into her again at the pool.
"Hey R, how are you? You know, one of my friends just started as an intern, and she's been in your ICU for past few weeks," I said.
"As a med student?" she asked.
"No, as an intern. I didn't know if you shared any patients, but I told her to look out for you," I said.
"Oh. I don't know the names of most of the housestaff. We don't really interact with them," she said. Matter of factly. Flatly.
I had to chuckle. Nurses complain that residents don't learn THEIR names all the time. I can only imagine what would have gone down had the tables been turned and *I* said that to *her*.
Also, it's not really the case that nurses don't interact with housestaff in the ICUs. I can say that as a med student, I interacted with nurses ALL THE TIME when my patients were in the unit. They saved my ass is what they did!
I don't know. Maybe she's just weird.
8 Pearls of Wisdom:
It's true, if the comment tables were turned it would be less PC.
In my experience ICU nurses are killer-smart and hard to interact with (prob because I am just a dumb ED nurse who knows very little about a lot). =)
She is not weird.
She is a b@#$h.
Eee gad.
my strategy for befriending icu nurses is to talk with them every day about every system. social, nutrition, neuro, pulmonary, cardiac, gi, renal, skin, and infection. it does not take long, it shows icu experience, and it works. for the friendship and for the patient.
Schizoid.
yes, i am
So the doctors in the ICU don't interact with the nurses in the ICU? Guh?
Actually, I was always convinced none of the nurses knew my name, which is why they always just called me "Doctor."
She's weird. And she's also likely downplaying or misrepresenting the truth. In a hospital with interns/house staff, of COURSE ICU nurses interact with them. It's freaking required. My mom is an LPN in a country ICU (read: sees and cares for every freaking thing not bad enough to require a Life Flight) and I can tell you that at least one third of her stories to me are about house staff. They don't really get interns or residents because they're rural. She doesn't have urban ICU experience directly - instead she worked with patients coming out of the ICU and coming off of vents and the like. Ready to come out of the ICU/hospital but not okay for home. Still at least a third of her stories were about the interns/residents/attendings.
I'm a NICU nurse, so I know nothing about adult ICU (other than adults don't have fontanels!), but I know that I interact with docs/residents/nurse practitioners DAILY (sometimes hourly!) I work at a very large NICU (105 beds) and still know names of most of the staff, even the residents who are only around for a month before they go somewhere else. If there wasn't interaction, patients would die.
Melissa
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