Saturday, August 04, 2007

SUNNY,HOT,HUMID

It's a little after 11am on this sunny Saturday.. and already it is 83 degrees.. to be 89 again today.. The nights are warm and balmy too..it makes the corn grow faster and tomatoes ripen faster too. I can't wait for the big tomatoes to be ready!
I am gainfully employed this weekend.. not fun.. just work. I get behind on about everything but my routines, and even then, things get a 'lick and a promise'. 181 days today till I can call my days 'my own'. It'll be a celebration for sure. I find myself getting really tired of the nonsense I'm up against at the hospital. Sometimes I feel like I'm doing my job, but are others? And, should I really be picking up their slack? I find so many errors in the charts and have been doing so for the past few months. I'm a perfectionist, so I'm really aware of where things need to be on the chart.. others apparently are not. Last night was a fine example- after the 3rd chart with paperwork out of order (everything has an order so information is easy to find), I stumbled across a page of medication orders unsigned and left in the progress notes by a physician. I can't tell you how often this happens. It was a page that should have been with the rest of the med orders that the doctor signed. He needed to check them "no" if he didn't want them reordered, but he just left it in the PN unsigned.. in the wrong place in the chart. I finally growled about it to the staff, and they simply replied "how come these things only happen while YOU are here?" I replied "they are happening every time I'm here because I check the charts carefully". What does this say for other secretaries? They aren't checking the charts.
It is the responsibility of the secretary at the end of her shift to check every chart for missed orders and initial the pages in red ink. My initials are the only ones present on any of the charts as far as I'm able to tell. I have brought this to the attention of my supervisor, but it's worse since I complained. I'm playing my own strategy now- I initial in red when I take the orders off, the other charts should have been carefully checked by the daylight secretary, and since she did not tell me that she didn't check the charts, I am safe in assuming she has if she is doing her job. Last night I dealt with most of the charts and tried this method. I normally find at least one order in the charts left from the previous shift, and have decided to "push back" when it is called to MY attention that the order is missed. I will have to remind the staff that it was not MY error, but that my complaints were not being heard, so I'm taking responsibility for what I do, not what the others do. It's not like they don't have time- I take report at 3pm sharp and they don't leave for another 30 minutes. Most of the time they are in the locker room "resting" while the charts are there waiting for them to check.
I have nothing to lose here.. I'll be gone in 181 days..
So I'm off to get myself ready for another frustrating evening- I can't say I'll miss this job. I used to love it, but the strain of my perfectionism is getting the best of me. It's time for me to move on.

Now I will get off my soapbox and get ready to go.

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