The little conference room was crowded and tension was high. Pam’s relatives and hospital personnel and me and my brother the priest who’d come down from Connecticut. The meeting had the atmosphere of a Teamsters’ bargaining session.
The women in the family had revolted. They wanted action. They wanted something done. They wanted answers. They wanted Nurse Kevin off the case. Complaints were made. People were called. Finally someone took control and a Family Meeting was scheduled wherein relevant staff and family members could come to an understanding.
There was talk of “clearing the air.”
A Conciliator had descended from the upper reaches of management to bring the two sides together. She was a handsome woman with a warm smile who sat poised with an expensive pen on her notepad. She projected confidence and control. She sat in a chair against the wall and crossed her professionally sexy legs in the manner of a TV anchorwoman.
“Well, let’s all see if we can do a better job of communicating. We all have Pam’s best interests at heart and we have to remember that…”
Staff feelings seemed to run as follows: generally, the lower in rank, the techs and nurses, tried to have patience with us. The doctor types were indignant – as in we are wasting precious time here. Nurse Kevin was not in attendance.
The reason Pam’s mother Jackie, and her sisters Laura and Lisa, and her daughter Kristi wanted Nurse Kevin gone was because Nurse Kevin viewed the overwhelming attention that Pam was getting as an invasion of his professional space. He had an attitude.
“What’s her blood pressure now? Does she have a fever? Why don’t her eyes close all the way? Shouldn’t you be putting drops in her eyes?”
Nurse Kevin snapped at Kristi one morning. He made it clear that all of his energies were focused on caring for the patients and that if Kristi wanted to speak with a doctor he’d get the doctor for her — which Kristi insisted upon — which made Nurse Kevin look foolish and unprofessional — which made him resent the family all the more.
We family members were chastised for abusing visiting privileges and of repeatedly violating the one spokesman per family rule. It was agreed that staff would give info to one person who would inform everyone else – sort of like pool reporting.
We said that all of us had to ask anyone we saw for information — any chance we had because information was hard to come by.
It had quickly become apparent to all of us that the nursing staff was stretched too thin. I could see why Nurse Kevin was on edge. They pile too much responsibility on these people – and I don’t think you’d find a nurse in America that disagrees with that.
Plenty of times, in plenty of hospitals, I have heard a voice as I walked by a patient’s room, some traumatized victim of disease or disaster or old age, someone who couldn’t reach the Styrofoam cup of ice water on the tray before them, calling out for help.
The first thing the Conciliator did was to toss Nurse Kevin overboard, which satisfied us, but made the staff clench together in solidarity and resentment. Maybe we’d gone too far. But the Conciliator kept things moving and pretty soon guidelines and boundaries were established and the meeting broke up to mutual grumbling.
I have a brother who is a priest who had been consulting with the staff. He asked me if it would be a good idea to administer Last Rights.
