What Patients Expect

Posted by nurse on August 13, 2011 under Uncategorized | Be the First to Comment

Many patients may be first time visitors to the admittance experience. Asking patients how many hospital stays they have had and how long ago that was can tell them how much information a patient needs to be comfortable with hospital processes and nursing norms. Find out if a patient needs counseling from a pastor, loved one, or next of kin to stabilize their mood.

Admittance puts a patient under complete twenty four care of multiple nurses, physicians, technical staff, even hospitality and housekeeping staff. Many patients are not prepared for this. They may need some time to adjust. Nurses should look at blood pressure, body English, sleep patterns and pulse statistics and read whether patients are entirely ready for the procedures ahead of them.

Patients may not be aware of their immediate need for admittance or be surprised by the incidence of it and be unprepared. The swift changes in floors, rooms, wards or departments may dismay or confuse them. The loss of privacy may seem routine to nurses, but shock patients, who find extraneous personnel invading their space on the slightest pretext. In order to chart fluids and collect samples, nurses should take care not to alienate patients and make them refuse to give us the last vestiges of privacy they feel they have.

Admitted hospital patients will have a room and a bed, a phone and a bathroom, an IV line, electrical conduits for other devices, and trash receptacles and movable surgical trays in a limited space. They may be surprised by the constant entry of household staff, nurses, physicians, and even doctors performing rounds if the facility is a teaching hospital.

Nurses should keep communication fluid and constant despite staff turnovers. If nurses can give patients a heads-up concerning their room traffic the hint will be greatly appreciated. Nurses discussing another case or personal business may continue a conversation while both are present in the hospital room of an unrelated patient, for example. Nurses should never repeat gossip, complain about supply shortages, or say anything to alarm a patient about their standard of care.