Friday 6 October 2023

An Ode to Community Nurses

 I Moved on today from my post as a community Respiratory Specialist Nurse and I wanted to shout out to all the community nurses out there what an amazing job you do


people think of frontline NHS and think of ICU or A and E but the community Nurses are more frontline than anyone realises


they see patients from cradle to grave, when they are sick deteriorating or are recovering , we keep them at home and try to avoid hospital admissions

we have no special equipment to manage a sick patient just standard observation kit and our own special skills of observation and judgement we are often the only person who has seen that patient in days and they trust us more than their own families.


we are out in rain snow sun hail and storms cold and hot weathers, we drive all around the areas we work sometimes with no clue where we are supposed to be but eventually we get there and we make a difference to someones day.


so I just want to say a special well done to all the community nurses out there whatever speciality you are we are a special breed and I was proud to be part of the gang for a while anyway.

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When God Created Nurses

When the Lord made Nurses He was into his sixth day of overtime.

An angel appeared and said, "You're doing a lot of fiddling around on this one." And the Lord said, "Have you read the specs on this order? A nurse has to be able to help an injured person, breathe life into a dying person, and give comfort to a family that has lost their only child and not wrinkle their uniform. They have to be able to lift 3 times their own weight, work 12 to 16 hours straight without missing a detail, console a grieving mother as they are doing CPR on a baby they know will never breathe again. They have to be in top mental condition at all times, running on too-little sleep, black coffee and half-eaten meals. And they have to have six pairs of hands.

The angel shook her head slowly and said, "Six pairs of hands...no way!" "It's not the hands that are causing me problems," said the Lord, "It's the two pairs of eyes a nurse has to have." "That's on the standard model?" asked the angel. The Lord nodded.

"One pair that does quick glances while making note of any physical changes, And another pair of eyes that can look reassuringly at a bleeding patient and say, "You'll be all right ma'am" when they know it isn't so."

"Lord," said the angel, touching his sleeve, "rest and work on this tomorrow." "I can't," said the Lord, "I already have a model that can talk to a 250 pound grieving family member whose child has been hit by a drunk driver...who, by the way, is laying in the next room uninjured, and feed a family of five on a nurse's paycheck."

The angel circled the model of the nurse very slowly, "Can it think?" she asked. "You bet," said the Lord. "It can tell you the symptoms of 100 illnesses; recite drug calculations in its sleep; intubate, defibrillate, medicate, and continue CPR nonstop until help arrives...and still it keeps its sense of humor. This nurse also has phenomenal personal control. They can deal with a multi-victim trauma, coax a frightened elderly person to unlock their door, comfort a murder victim's family, and then read in the daily paper how nurses are insensitive and uncaring and are only doing a job." Finally, the angel bent over and ran her finger across the cheek of the nurse.

"There's a leak," she pronounced. "I told you that you were trying to put too much into this model." "That's not a leak," said the Lord, "It's a tear." "What's the tear for?" asked the angel. "It's for bottled-up emotions, for patients they've tried in vain to save, for commitment to the hope that they will make a difference in a person's chance to survive, for life." "You're a genius," said the angel.

The Lord looked somber. "I didn't put it there," He said.