Nurse Called Out Of Surgery And Laid Off

MADISON, Wis. — A nurse was called out of surgery so a manager could tell her she was being laid off. Dean Health said the surgery was minor and the patient wasn't affected, but the manager who summoned the nurse from surgery violated medical protocol. Dean Health spokesman Paul Pitas said the incident happened at Dean's West Clinic in Madison on Wednesday or Thursday.

Pitas said there was a period of time in which a nurse wasn't present during the procedure. He said while there were other clinical staff present, the absence of a nurse is a violation of patient care procedures.

The Madison-based health care provider announced Wednesday that it planned to "immediately" lay off 90 employees.

Pitas declined to name the employees involved or what type of surgery the nurse was attending when she was called away.

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Information from: Wisconsin State Journal, http://www.madison.com/wsj

Comments

[up420oz]

& can any Americans tell me why the US has a "better" health care system then Canada?

I'm waiting.....

[tbone99]

As a nurse i was rountinely sent home if the bed numbers decreased below a certain patient to nurse ratio, even if I had just arrived in the past hour. And it never concerned them the acuity of the patients on the floor- if one nurse was tied up with a patient coding and had 5 other neglected patients that did not matter. The only thing important was the return on the investor dollar.

[stevi]

In a corporate sense, I believe that there is little or no interest in medical care for those among us who happen to be ill, injured or born with a medical condition (just try to get your newborn with a significant heart problem added to your existing insurance). It is all about profit and it will not change until the calling to this profession is not motivated by profit. Not all those who enter health care are called by $, among these are probably the nurses who are the primary care givers. Doctors, however, enter their profession with a couple of hundred thousand dollars in student loans to pay off. Not that all Doctors are in their profession for profit, just that you need to make a big salary to pay off those loans. The cost of a good medical education contributes to this situation in a huge way.

[lysistrata]

Solve the problem, free universities just like other advanced nations do. Nurses have educational bills to pay too. Poor Cuba trains more medical people than it needs and we have to go to India to hire physicians. Patients dying in ER unattended happens in the free market managed health care, not in socialized health care. Our problem is profit ueber alles. Insurance industry and the health care industry needs to make profits for the shareholders, health care is only the means to that end.

[zukervati]

Another victim of Republican Family Values (RFV).

[nobozos]

Our wonderful national "for-profit" health care system at work.

Do these moronic tea-baggers realize that the US (along with that other shining example of democracy, South Africa) are the only first-world countries on the planet without universal health care?

It's shameful.

[Taaif Mehadi]

Universal healthcare but that remind me of Hitler and stalin because sean hannity told me so, surely the rich as*hole with a tv show on fox news knows whats better for me than myself.

[lysistrata]

Lets tell Hannity and Rush and friends health care came before Hitler, it goes back to Bismarck, 1870 something, the 18th century if they can't do the math. It survived two lost world wars and the depression. Some 130 years to be correct, it is old and we have not even made the first step, how regressive we are. And the German economy survived all the time too. The Russian revolution happened at the end of the first WW some 35 years after socialized health care.

[jukesgrrl]

I agree, nobozos. Our present healthcare system puts patient care at the bottom of the priority list. But the tea-baggers will never see this differently. They are incapable of setting aside their labels to participate in the making of a new system. We're going to have a change, but it's going to be ugly and some of the people who will benefit the most will scream the loudest, just as they did with the recent tax revisions. (I'm especially fascinated by people who have no estate to speak of, yet are obsessed with "death taxes.")

[texhall00]

Where are your manners? How rude!

[jonolennon]

I thought there was a huge nursing shortage in America? What gives?

[CaliRN]

The nursing shortage is coming in 4 to 5 years. The average age of OR nurses is 55 years old.

California has Nurse-to-Patient ratios mandated by law for patient safety. This attracts RNs to California. Now the big hospital organizations are trying to abolish the ratios.

Many nurses fear that big business will seek to change requirements for staffing for direct patient care, i.e., assign tasks that only RNs can do to less educated, less experienced, less qualified personnel or have machines do patient monitoring. Less support personnel (nurse aides, transport personnel) are available to us recently so now we feel more rushed than ever.

Many nurses that I know are seeking new career paths that do not involve direct patient care because the environment is becoming more and more rushed. Some of the nurses on my unit do not get a lunch or they miss breaks. Many of my patients ask me how many patients I have when they see me and other nurses going non-stop throughout the day. As instructed by managment, we must not show that we are rushed or that we have not had our breaks/lunch.

Four nurses on my unit have had surgery on their backs. Five have moved on to new careers in the last year. Yes, there will be a nursing shortage and unfortunately, the patients will suffer the most.

[schatsie]

There is NO NURSING shortage, just nurses tired of being shafted....They have been importing nurses like they imported slaves...

[jukesgrrl]

Well, dear heaven, how could you expect nurses to be paid a decent wage until all the children of all the doctors are driving Mercedes and have condos to live in during college?

[Chaimirija]

with all due respect to caliRN, who's post is eloquent and polite, the truth is:

THEY TREAT NURSES LIKE S.H.I.T.E.

[inthedesert]

THERE IS NO HOPE FOR HUMANITY.............NONE.

[skymuffin]

In all of these corporations and bureaucratic organizations, rather than laying off people who actually do work, they could save a lot of money by getting rid of layers of management. If you've ever worked in a large or medium-sized organization, didn't you notice people whose purpose seemed to be kissing up to the boss, going to meetings, and generally, taking up a lot of wasted space?

[mergina]

Is there any doubt that there is absolutely no hope for humanity?

[peteRed]

for humanity there will be always be some hope....for profit driven economy I lost it long long time ago!

[EgyptianMysterySchool]

As long as children are being born, there's hope for humanity.

[kid5rivers2]

The converse is also true.

[markm8128]

Meanwhile...we are ramping up military spending in Afghanistan.

[Harrier]

Private medicine is worthless

[peteRed]

I may add that private medicine means making profit on your health! put people before profit, let's have a good public health system and let the rich pay for their private clinics!

[apoyo]

Nurses are patient advocates most and foremost. Her first duty was to her patient and not to answer the call of bureaucracy.

Nurse managers are nurses, so what happened is doubly wrong.

[schatsie]

Don't forget, if you don't kiss but, you are being INSUBORDINATE....

[Citizen54]

Were the administrators afraid the poor nurse was going to pick up an extra hour of pay or something?

By the way, it's nurses who keep hospitals running, not the admin folks.

[sueinmn]

Too bad the manager wasn't laid off!