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Balancing Beds
Most people work at a desk. I don’t. I work at a bed. Or, rather, I work at beds. On any given work day, I have between 2 and 15 beds as my workspace. Some of my time (actually, a depressingly large and increasing portion of my time) is spent at a computer, but the bulk of my time is spent at bedsides. As a nurse, that is where I belong. Documentation and communication with other team members or patients’ families are important, but ultimately, I can’t do my job without being near my patient. I need to see, feel and hear them in order to assess their state. I need to be physically present to assist them with basic activities of living like eating or bathing. I need to be there to help them move. Medical acts like performing an ECG or putting in an IV line require me to be hands on. Almost every aspect of my job requires me to be there, at the bedside, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Very broadly, my job is to assist and evaluate my patients’ states and compensate for them where necessary with the goal of increasing their independence and improving their state. Some patients are entirely independent and merely require medication administration or dressing changes. Others require full care for every aspect of their life: we turn them in bed, wash and dress them, change continence pads, prevent…
