TGIF...

I've never been happier to see the end of a work week.
It has been super busy in the Recovery Room. With summer vacations being over, the surgeons are all back full-force working on the backlog of patients awaiting their operations.
The days were hectic, and patients were generally very grateful that a)their surgeries were finally over b) that they were alive and c)that there was a hospital bed assigned to them.
One patient stands out this week because she was the most obnoxious, manipulative, rude, passive-aggressive Wench that I've ever come across in sixteen years of nursing. I was very nice and accommodating to her, although, I must admit, when she wasn't looking, I was rolling my eyeballs around so much that it hurt. And, as time passed, I would really have liked to have given her a good swift kick to the head (only I'm not limber enough.) But, let me reitterate: I was polite to her...at no point did I intentionally antagonize her. I have witnesses!
This woman has had a significant chronic illness since she was 8. So, she has been in and out of hospitals since then and let's just say, that she knows her way around hospitals probably better than any doctor or nurse. Because of this illness, she has abnormal muscle tone, so this surgery was the second blilateral browlift that she has had in a few years. (Ummm..not sure but the surgeon might have actually overcompensated the browlift so he wouldn't have to deal with her again...her brows were perfect semi-circles located quite close to her browline. She kind of looked like she was going to have a permanent SURPRISED! look which, I must admit, was incredibly comical.) (And, she had little beady eyes) However, comical she was not.
This woman gave me such a hard time when she found out where her bed assignment was. In our hospital, the plastic surgury beds are shared with the orthopaedic unit. She felt that the nurses would not be able to handle her condition adequately, that she needed to be assigned on a unit with neurosurgical patients. So...she would rather be sharing a room with a head injured trauma patient, that someone with a broken bone. (OK>>>WTF?!) I tried assuring her that the nurses were well aware of her condition, and would be able to handle it. She threatened to pull out her IV, find her clothes and leave the hospital if she was being forced to go there. She wanted to speak to the Hospital Administrator. Then she started the spitting. She spat and spat and spat some more, and I was so grossed out! She told me she was having an asthma attack and if she were at home, she would take her puffer. Uh...Ya...right. I didn't hear a single wheeze, but I humoured her. I got her a brand new puffer, and a brand new aerochamber ( a plastic thing that makes it a little easier to take puffers)
Then I called her surgeon, told him I was having a problem with her, that she didn't want to go to her assigned bed, and also needed a specific kind of pain medication for her, because "nothing else worked for her" and that she was being rather difficult.
Anyway...blah-dee-blah-dee-blah...long story short...she refused to sign the Leave Against Medical Advice form without "Her Lawyer present" but left anyway and took the freakin' bus home...Highbrows and all.
I had a funny feeling about her, so I filled in all kinds of forms, wrote myself an email about her and called the appropriate Hospital Higher-ups. They, of course ignored my phone message, until.....
...Yesterday, she decided to return to the hospital to file a complaint about me. Apparently, I have given her HIV from a dirty aerochamber and she was demanding bloodwork to be done! Can you friggin' believe that?!?!?!?!
The Patient Advocate to whom she was complaining to, recalled my message so suddenly she had the heads up! There was no reasoning with this psycho woman and she eventually made her way to the CEO of the hospital! OMG!!!
In a way, I'm impressed because I would have no idea what the $2 Million Man looked like, and she had the balls to sit in his office and refuse to leave until she had her wishes met! I can only hope that he might sympathize with a lowly nurse upon meeting the likes of her.
So, she had her HIV test.
But I'll bet at least $2 Million that that won't be the last time that she wreaks havoc in Ontario's hospital system.