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OK, let me inaugurate the new Sickbay area with a story from my days in correctional nursing.
Some years ago, I worked as a nurse in my local county jail. My job was to do health screenings of new inmates: get a health history, vital signs, list of medications, and identify any health care issues that needed to be dealt with right away . . . like insulin for the diabetics. Twice a week, a PA would come in and do full physicals. I'd also do TB skin tests on everyone. We had a part time dentist who came once a week (part of my job was cleaning and sterilizing his instruments for him), and a psychiatrist who came in once a week to see the mental health patients.
We had an in house pharmacy: we ordered certain meds that we gave a lot of (aspirin, tylenol, cold meds, specific BP, heart, diabetic meds, even HIV meds) in bulk, and processed them into "blister packs" similar to what nursing homes use. A blister pack is a card with 30 individual doses of a medication sealed into it Once a week I would go through all the med carts and make new blister packs.
In the evenings, before lockdown, I would make rounds on the housing units. We had 3 main general population units (2 male, one female). I'd go through a door into a hallway; on either side were pods that were the inmate living areas (no direct contact with the inmates) and the control room for the block. I would go to each door and the inmates could come and ask me questions about any concerns they had. A lot of times I would give them suggestions on how to handle this that or the other without their having to submit a sick call request (which cost them $4).
One day, I was confronted by an inmate who was unhappy with the doctor because the doctor would not order a stomach medication the inmate wanted (Zantac, to be specific) for heart burn. The doctor refused to order it because he wanted to do a complete medical work up including labs, and he didn't want to mask the symptoms before he knew what he was treating. The doctor suspected something more serious than heartburn. The inmate was refusing to cooperate with bloodwork, so the doctor would not order the medication.
The inmate was irate and wanted to complain about the doctor endlessly.
Me: Look, you know what you need to do. Let me get the blood, and the doc will order the med you want.
IM: He's jerking me around! I'm in pain, he HAS to give me what I want! It's malpractice for him not to give me my medicine.
Me: It would be malpractice for him to prescribe medication without a complete medical evaluation. He thinks there is something more going on; he could be giving you the wrong thing.
Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
After a few minutes I got tired of the tirade. I said, "Look, this conversation is going nowhere. You know what you need to do. When you're ready to let me draw your blood, let me know and I'll do it and then see if the doctor is ready to write the order for what you want."
I started to walk away from the door. The inmate, now in a lather, yelled out, "BITCH!"
I calmly turned around, smiled, and responded, "That's Nurse Bitch to you." Then I walked away while the inmate stood there slack jawed and the other inmates laughed at him.
After that, the CO's and the inmates referred to me as Nurse Bitch, a title I held with pride for the two years I worked there
Some years ago, I worked as a nurse in my local county jail. My job was to do health screenings of new inmates: get a health history, vital signs, list of medications, and identify any health care issues that needed to be dealt with right away . . . like insulin for the diabetics. Twice a week, a PA would come in and do full physicals. I'd also do TB skin tests on everyone. We had a part time dentist who came once a week (part of my job was cleaning and sterilizing his instruments for him), and a psychiatrist who came in once a week to see the mental health patients.
We had an in house pharmacy: we ordered certain meds that we gave a lot of (aspirin, tylenol, cold meds, specific BP, heart, diabetic meds, even HIV meds) in bulk, and processed them into "blister packs" similar to what nursing homes use. A blister pack is a card with 30 individual doses of a medication sealed into it Once a week I would go through all the med carts and make new blister packs.
In the evenings, before lockdown, I would make rounds on the housing units. We had 3 main general population units (2 male, one female). I'd go through a door into a hallway; on either side were pods that were the inmate living areas (no direct contact with the inmates) and the control room for the block. I would go to each door and the inmates could come and ask me questions about any concerns they had. A lot of times I would give them suggestions on how to handle this that or the other without their having to submit a sick call request (which cost them $4).
One day, I was confronted by an inmate who was unhappy with the doctor because the doctor would not order a stomach medication the inmate wanted (Zantac, to be specific) for heart burn. The doctor refused to order it because he wanted to do a complete medical work up including labs, and he didn't want to mask the symptoms before he knew what he was treating. The doctor suspected something more serious than heartburn. The inmate was refusing to cooperate with bloodwork, so the doctor would not order the medication.
The inmate was irate and wanted to complain about the doctor endlessly.
Me: Look, you know what you need to do. Let me get the blood, and the doc will order the med you want.
IM: He's jerking me around! I'm in pain, he HAS to give me what I want! It's malpractice for him not to give me my medicine.
Me: It would be malpractice for him to prescribe medication without a complete medical evaluation. He thinks there is something more going on; he could be giving you the wrong thing.
Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
After a few minutes I got tired of the tirade. I said, "Look, this conversation is going nowhere. You know what you need to do. When you're ready to let me draw your blood, let me know and I'll do it and then see if the doctor is ready to write the order for what you want."
I started to walk away from the door. The inmate, now in a lather, yelled out, "BITCH!"
I calmly turned around, smiled, and responded, "That's Nurse Bitch to you." Then I walked away while the inmate stood there slack jawed and the other inmates laughed at him.
After that, the CO's and the inmates referred to me as Nurse Bitch, a title I held with pride for the two years I worked there
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