Here it is, the best one-liner I have heard of from a patient, a terminally ill person fully aware of the prognosis, but with an inexhaustible zest for life and marvelous sense of humor:
BIDMC Nurse: Let me get you into this recliner and make you comfortable. Put your feet up, relax. Would you like me to get a sheet to cover you?
Patient: Actually, I'm trying to avoid that.
I love being a nurse and being able to have a good laugh in the worst of life's circumstances.
ReplyDeletePaul, you are doing a great job here at BIDMC. I just started reading your blog a few weeks ago after attending the Nursing Awards. I admire your openness and insightfullness. It makes me proud to work here. Oh, and by the way any news on the possible pay increase ? :)
PS- I'm so glad we are not a union hospital even though we benfit from there actions elsewhere in the city.
ReplyDeleteHave a great day.
And from another patient, post-stroke, submitted with great respect for all the nurses who don't say things like this:
ReplyDeleteNurse: Take your medicine for me, honey.
(NB: "honey" is 73-years-old and doesn't take to being patronized)
Pt: "Why, are you sick?"
Great one liner there. Sobering as well for any health care worker.
ReplyDeleteI wanna meet the patient who said that.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if it's true, but supposedly when Oscar Wilde was on his deathbed, he looked around the room and said "Either this wallpaper goes, or I do."
Perfect. :)
My favorite comment from a dying patient, an elderly women who was paralyzed after a fall and was now on comfort care. One morning on rounds I asked, "how's breakfast" her reply, "foods fine but there is something wrong with the menu!", "What" I asked? She said "There's no cyanide on it" She died about 12 hours later.
ReplyDelete