This week at Madison

Here are a few of the interesting topics I've encountered dealing with my patients this week. Links to appropriate resources are also included for more information.

Before I headed back to the evening shift, I got to admit a fellow from a far western state. Our unit may be the red-headed stepchild of the SCI system, but we have a reputation for healing people with wounds that can't get healed anywhere else. (It also helps that our boss has friends in a major research hospital in town, too.)

The new guy, Mr. C., got a room with a fellow (Mr. W.) who's also had step one of the same type of surgery he's being evaluated for--girdlestone surgery. Said patient is pretty nice, but physically, mentally and emotionally, he's been a trainwreck. Patient was a victim of violence. Patient has several health problems now directly related to the incident: short gut syndrome, and a whole bunch of other things. The dietician has put him on an FAA diet (free amino acid) with a different type of formula--Vivonex. It's really amazing that he's as positive as he is.

Mr. K., our elderly gentleman who's just about to hit one year at our place (on and off, with trips to acute at Washington) came back yesterday from Washington. He had some mental status changes (possibly medication related) and also mastoiditis. Some of the staff were a little upset with him because he told the folks at Washington that there were "drug problems" at Madison. (One of his previous roommates was discharged due to drug issues.) While Mr. K. is a little off sometimes, more often than not, he's very astute to things. As a consequence, he's very upset that he's back in his old room, and he told us if he could get up he'd probably slug his roommate. Nice. It should be interesting to see what the boss decides to do with him, since we're running at full capacity and getting four new people next week. There aren't enough rooms to make another room isolation right now...

Nuggets
Here are a few other goodies to check out this week, if you haven't already.

I found this cancer article in the NY Times this week, along with another article about doctors and condolences.

MonkeyGirl's Rehab post was just a riot. Head on over and read it for a good laugh.

RehabRN book club items
I recently finished reading Best care anywhere by Phillip Longman. Even if you don't work at the VA, this is a fascinating book.

I'm still working on From Silence to Voice by Suzanne Gordon and Bernice Buresh about nurses and communicating to the public.

On a non-nursing note, I finished Elizabeth Berg's The day I ate whatever I wanted. This was a great book. I really loved the apple pie recipe story near the back.

BTW visitor 5000 showed up here on 8/12/08 at 11:42:55PM from beautiful, downtown Chicago, IL via www.nurseratchedsplace.com. Thanks for your visit!

More later...stay tuned.