Doing the wrongest thing for the right reasons.

Several times in my career I have had to do things to a patient so cruel that I was physically ill afterwards. Both times they were lifesaving measures. Something that made the difference between life and death, and something they had no memory of later.

At the time though, they experienced it, fought it, and lived that horrible moment.

But they lived, with good outcomes. They and their family were grateful for the care we gave and the interventions that were used.

I still occasionally have nightmares about one of them.

In my day-to-day practice I hold a person’s hand and talk soothingly to them until they are unconscious, whereupon I make a remarkable transition from a kind hearted person to looking at the patient to a nurse seeing them as a puzzle needing to be solved. Intubation tube in. Catheterisation done. Patient positioned as required for surgery. Dislocate the hip for better access. Suction. Diathermy. Sutures.

We do awful things to people

Awful.

Well documented, fully researched, best practice, global standards of awfulness.

It’s not until I am at the pub and make a flippant comment related to “burning the patient” and have to explain that it was deliberate and totally ok, that I realise how truly messed up what we do is.

Actually, what we do isn’t messed up, it’s how we get our heads around it that is messed up. Everyone varies in how they cope. But I PROMISE that if you know and love a nurse, that they disassociate in some way, in order to do what needs to be done on a daily basis. The alternative is the disturbing concept that they are ok with doing what they do to a person that they get to know.

So next time you ask someone who cares about you to look at you like a patient, and diagnose or help you Please don’t get upset if their face goes oddly blank, and they give their answers in a way that doesn’t seem entirely like them. And do not get cranky with us because we are unsympathetic. You are asking us to do our job. To look at your body as a just a sum of its parts, a puzzle to be solved, a problem to be fixed. We can’t CARE how it feels. We can empathise, but not sympathise.

It’s an important differentiation.

They are looking at you like a patient, because if we cared when we had to do what we do, it would rip us to tiny pieces every day.

I’m definitely a theatre nurse.

When some-one stabs you with a sharp needle covered in a strangers blood, because they aren’t concentrating, and your response is... Oh, don’t feel bad, these things happen.
You are probably a theatre nurse.

When you walk into a house you are thinking about buying and you automatically check the ceiling…
You are probably a theatre nurse.

When you can talk for hours about topics that don’t involve anything controversial, or go for days without speaking until spoken to…

If it is a choice to brush your hair before work, because no-one will know if you don’t…
You are probably a theatre nurse.

If your nails never grow long enough to bite because of the chemicals you rub on them hundreds of times a day…
You are probably a theatre nurse.

If you can hold around 5 kilos of weight in a strange position for hours at a time…
You are probably a theatre nurse.

If, when your foot starts getting warm and wet, you just assume it has fallen asleep rather than checking if something warm and wet is leaking on it…
You are probably a theatre nurse.

If your idea of funny is body fluids in someone’s shoe…
You are probably a theatre nurse.

All my love to all you OR nurses out there.
Kia Kaha.
x

Get your Tits out for the Girls; the educational version.

In light of NZ Girl's freaking revolting campaign, I have decided to do one with the same name, but an educational version that people might actually learn something from.

Because, just as breasts differ, so do the cases of breast cancer.

Some catch it early...



and can receive a lumpectomy, keeping the breast.



For some there is no discernable lump, but they notice discolouration


For larger breasts lumps are less noticeable and so they are at higher risk for late detection




In the case of a later stage breast cancer a mastectomy is sometimes needed.




Or a double mastectomy.



Breast cancer occurs in Men more rarely (2% of all breast cancer) but has the same risk of fatality.



In later stages most cancers can become ulcerative – breast cancer is no different.



And it can metastasise out of the breast to the rest of the body, via the lymph nodes.



This is why women often have Axillary Lymph node dissections at the time of a mastectomy.



Please get your breasts checked by mammogram, it’s free in NZ if you are:

Aged 45 to 69 years of age
You have no symptoms of breast cancer
You have not had a mammogram in the last 12 months
And you are not pregnant



AND check them yourself regularly.