YOU COUNT
No one should ever, and I mean ever, feel like a number, or a medical file, while waiting on care at a cancer center.
If that has happened to you, don’t stand for it again. Instead, stand-up, find someone who can direct you to a supervisor and complain. LOUDLY.
Cancer may be changing your health. It may be changing the way you look and the way you feel, but it hasn’t taken away who you are. You are a bright, functioning, person. YOU count, just like anyone else counts in this world. No one should have the ability to make you feel less than that.
So, if that happens, get up and get angry. It’s OK to voice your opinion.
Cancer centers employ a lot of people. Some of them, unfortunately, were absent the day they taught manners and how to treat a patient. So it’s up to you to sometimes do a little teaching on your treatment day.
Remember, you’re not a number, but you do count!!
April 14, 2011 @ 9:55 am
While I have encountered some insensitive medical personnel, I must also tell you about my most recent experience at St. Joseph’s Hospital here in Atlanta during my wife’s stay after a triple bypass.
One floor nurse said as we were leaving my wife’s room to go to surgery..”I’ll pray for you.”
The nurse pushing her gurney to the surgery prep area said..”Everything will be alright. Don’t you worry. God is in charge.”
Several volunteers I encountered in the patient waiting area said….”I’ll pray for your wife. She is in excellent hands here.”
2 chaplains came by to visit and offer a prayer.
Daily prayers over the speaker system at 9:00am and 9:00pm.
Perhaps there is a culture and a tone at St. Joseph’s established by the nuns that the vast majority of the staff reflect in dealing with families and patients. I am not naive, there are probably some who are insensitive and make needless and hurtful comments at St. Joseph’s. If they are reported, they will not be there for long unless they mend their ways. I took the time to write a long email detailing much of this along with the names of the nurses who took care of my wife to thank them for their professionalism as well as compassion. All of us know that nurses bear the brunt of the healing after the surgery is done and often they are not given the credit they deserve.
April 14, 2011 @ 12:50 am
Most of the people we interacted with were great, but one aide in the hospital, just after my husband’s unsuccessful surgery and the prediction that he had 3-6 months to live kept telling us about her uncle who had lung cancer and died. I asked that she not be in the room any more—one of my few assertive acts. I also don’t think it is just in the health profession that this happens—I hear similar insensitive comments in other professions, too, but it is especially hurtful in the life and death world of cancer.
April 13, 2011 @ 11:21 pm
Medical professionals are only human and most of the time they do a great job, but let me tell you some of the things I’ve heard:
Oncology nurse to my wife- “We all have to die sometime.”
Oncology nurse to my wife- “I can’t believe the number of people who just give up. You won’t be seeing ____ anymore.”
Radiologist to my wife who had just commented that she was blessed to be relatively symptom free-“Oh, don’t worry,that will change (chuckle) that will change.” His prediction proved false. Thanks to the work of valid professionals much discomfort can be avoided and incredible healing can take the place of disease. I carry the many waiting room stories of victory in my heart. They give me peace.
Hospital housekeeper to me: “Your wife can be confusing-almost mean spirited.” Me-“Did they tell you my wife has a brain tumor?”
Embarrassed,thoughtful-night shift ER physician (who was treating my wife for fever and dehydration) scolding a thoughtless radiology tech: “Please remove the lung x-rays out of the patient’s view.”
Hospice social worker to our priest at his sixth visit to the facility in 36 hours. Father was sitting at my wife’s side-reading to her. He had just completed an open prayer service for over two-dozen people, many in attendance just happened to be near our room: … “I have a lot of problems with your church.”
April 13, 2011 @ 6:00 pm
I wish I could go to medical office staff meetings and let them get a glimpse of the other side. It’s not just about the test and the following treatment for total well being.