The medication is a blood thinner, the patient is a competent adult not in delirium, A&OX4. There are 2 ways to see this:

Manager’s and a group of doctor’s POV: you are a nurse and it’s your job and duty to do that. Plus, we know better than him what’s good for him. These people have built their identity around working in healthcare and to them this means I have to stay in the room and make sure the patient takes the medication.

My POV: nursing is not a calling but a job. What my manager and these doctors think is stupid:

  • the patient is a competent adult not in delirium, A&OX4. He’s old enough to know what happens if he doesn’t take the medication because we have told him a number of times already. I’m not his father and I’m not ready to treat a competent adult like a child.

  • I have other patients and I’m not going to waste my time watching a patient silently until he decides to take the medication. I’m charting that I left the medication next to him and told him he needs it and why and that I have other patients to take care of.

  • It is stupid to watch a person while doing nothing when I should be working with my other patients. It’s also invasive as f*ck.

I see it like this: my manager and this group of doctors are not ready to respect a person’s autonomy whereas I’m not ready to ignore this same autonomy, even if it means a negative outcome. Respecting a consenting adult’s autonomy means respecting his bad choices as well. I feel this group of doctors and my manager are not ready to respect any patient’s autonomy.

At this moment, this is a hill I’m willing to die on. AITA?

ETA: I wrote about a group of doctors, because there are other doctors that don’t give me hard time if a patient refuses his medication, they simply chart it and move on. I like working with doctors like this because I feel they don’t judge and respect the patient’s autonomy as well.

  • intensely_human
    21·
    6 months ago

    You say nursing is only a job to you and not a calling, and yet here you are taking on career risk to yourself just so you can respect the autonomy of a patient whose autonomy is being disrespected by everyone else.

    I love you for existing. As an adult, I would feel far safer under your care knowing that you would treat me as an adult.

    Because as everyone knows, the actively harmful version of this “treating adults as children” philosophy in medical care is when they don’t believe what you’re saying, claiming you’re trying to get attention.

    What you’re fighting against is simple indignity. But the side effect of your fight is that people are protected from medical negligence as well.

    Thank you so much. I won’t blame you either way, but I will love you dearly if you continue to take personal risks for the well-being of your patients.