I'm an evil, awful, despicable person. I had to take care of an elderly woman who is not only very confused, but also only speaks Romanian. Not a lick of English. Try talking sense into that. We tried calling family and having them talk to her to explain that lab needed to draw blood and I needed to give her insulin in her arm. Her son had left us a list of translated words. Unfortunately, they left out useful phrases, sentences and key words like "insulin", "blood sugar", "lab needs to draw blood", "we're not going to hurt you"...and many more useful terms that I could have used this morning. So, when Rachel with sharp needle in hand came poking towards her arm, cooperation was not to be had. Instead, it was kicking, flailing, and very likely a long line of curse words directed at yours truly. Who knows what she said, but I'm pretty damn sure it wasn't "Wow, you are the most wonderful nurse in the world".
The nursing assistant who had sat in the room all night and another nursing assistant had to help hold down her body and restrain her arms as I poked quickly and also tried not to poke myself or one of the aides. I felt absolutely rotten for it.
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5 comments:
So is she just being diagnosed as diabetic? Do you give insulin for other reasons? If she was a diabetic, wouldn't she understand needles? You aren't so Terrible.
Now you must demand an internet connection in your ward for translation assistance!
Where are the Babelfish when you need them??
She has been diabetic for quite some time. So, you would think that she would understand a shot in the underarm. And we do have internet on all of the units. I just looked up a Romanian translator on the web. The word I get for medication is completely different than what her son had left for us (and he gave us multiple versions of the word). I don't think she would have gone for the injection no matter how fluently we spoke.
i agree w/ lizz- get an internet connection on your ward for just this reason!
We DO have an internet connection on all of our units (as I said before). That still doesn't teach me how to speak Romanian to a woman with dementia.
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