District Nursing... Pass

Ok, let me start of by saying I went into this placement expecting to broaden my bandaging techniques, perhaps become a semi-amateur regarding diabetes, I didn't expect to be kicked in the head....

Since day one I knew it was going to be awful... Today kind of proved it....

If you can be bothered for a long winded piece of moanage' continue!

Got to work at 7:35, wanted to show initiative, which people apparently like! No one showed up till 8:00. Fair enough, no problem, at this point I'd already been up for 2 hours.

Went in, got told to go with a certain DN due to there not being a lot of staff on and my mentor was doing managerial things all day, also sensible however then problems started popping up; such as, going to a patients house to take blood and then leaving the house without the sample, (was not my responsibility, due to I can't take blood and this woman should have picked up some commonsense after nursing for 30+years...) Before we even got in that house, she freaked out because of a DRAFT EXCLUDER that looked like a snake, she was near screaming..... You can imagine what I was muttering under my breath? Yeah, all those colourful words...

When she forgot the blood she proceeded to search her car because she was certain it was in there, I was not. I told her this and she took no notice... going back and taking another sample was apparently not an option, because she had bad veins.... (Or you’re a shit phlebotomist yeah...) The patient phoned the office and said she found the blood... we went back, me slightly smug because I was correct.

Got there, and the patient didn't let her in. I was again, muttering all these colourful words, because she was shouting at the door, making a total idiot of herself and there’s me sitting in a car bright yellow that looks like a sponge... That passed, she gave up...

You would think that was enough eh? No.

We went to the next patient’s house for an incontinence assessment. Simple, because all they wanted to do was change the type of pads, nothing fancy, should have been a 30 minute job, TOPS. They had a wooden (quite nice) statue of a cobra on their mantle piece... at this point we're sitting on the couch, the DN' notices this and ducks behind me at such a rate that her leg swings up and bops me in the head... funny from the outside I know.

She was screaming about this stupid statue that was 13 inches in height; that was made from wood! I was telling her that the carer had removed the object and asking her if she could act normal for one moment, but she continued to whale...

After she had decided she had hit me and scratched my back enough she continued, except she didn't know what to do. So I did it, she kept trying to give me guidance, LOVE it’s a check box system! Ask the question; get the answer; just because you’re unable to comprehend the simplest of things doesn’t mean I'm not.

ARGH!

Rant over with.... Laugh, because if it happened to you guys I would.