In the middle of the night...

I went to sleep around 11, and got up around 2.30 and tossed and turned, so here I am! I don't want to wake Ralph up. The home care nurse was here yesterday, and PT will be here this morning. I want her to work on the outside steps with me, if it's not to hot out. 


I walked back and forth thru the house all day, which the carpet makes not as easy as tile. Seems like I'd be up for two hours and sleep for two hours. Sitting on the loveseat is just not comfortable for long. It's not that the knee actively hurts, it just is there. And putting the right foot up on the ottoman to stretch it out hurts! Ortho said I need 0 degrees for a normal gait, so I'll persevere. 


The nursing staff at rehab was - interesting. I was there 10 days, and only one nurse looked at my ID bracelet! Two times a nurse tried to give me the wrong narcotic, and once they handed me someone else's labelled eyedrops. What set me off totally was the day I was told that I didn't have a 6 a.m. med. When the day nurse came in with my synthroid, which nights never signed out, and my vicodin, and handed them to me, I went off. 


I said "You are handing me a narcotic and you have no idea who I am! You did not look at my bracelet, or at least ask my name! That's Nursing 101." Her response was to ask if my room # was correct on the bracelet (the one she didn't look at) and the answer was no.


Patient relations made her daily visit, and I told her of my concern. She went right to the nurse manager, who later came to see me. She started out defensive- rehab is different, the nurses know their patients, yada yada. I called her on it- it was several nurses, who didn't know me at all, handing me narcs and cardiac meds. By the end of our conversation she was planning refreshers for her staff in proper procedure and giving them all letters about what happened. 


The day I was discharged, the nurse manager walked out with us. She told me she was cringing inside as a nurse when I told her what was happening. One of those things she assumed her staff was doing correctly, and was horrified to find out they weren't. She assured me there would be changes made, and she seemed quite sincere. I hope she follows thru, before there is a catastrophe. 


And now I'm going back to bed. 
Holly