How Nursing Professionals Deal with Difficult Patients and Co-Workers
People in general can be difficult to deal with and one thing they don't teach you in nursing school is how to deal with annoying co-workers and difficult patients.
If you work in a hospital, you probably work 12-hour shifts. Those long hours can go right by or slog on endlessly depending on many factors, such as patients who are just demanding and never seem to be satisfied with anything that you do for them or a coworker who sits at the desk, reading, talking or texting while everyone run around like rats in a race.
Research has shown that 1 in 3 nurses have likely experienced some sort of physical or emotional abuse this month. Have you?
No one is perfect, but from a patient care and satisfaction perspective, and in order to stay in good terms with your fellow nurses and deal with difficult behavior from patients, you should consider the following tips:
- Don’t attempt to change their behavior. People will not change just because you told them to, and their behavior will not change unless they decide to take liability of their impoliteness.
- Don’t take it personally. They may be just experiencing a difficult phase in their lives. The patient’s sickness may have a huge influence on her mood or your co-worker may just be really exhausted. They may have issues at home or have many other things that are affecting their behavior.
- Be nice yet establish firm restrictions. Remember that your role as nurses is not only to provide safe care, but also to provide support. But if you feel like being insulted, you can always civilly express displeasure by saying “I treat you with respect, and I expect the same in return, sir.”
- Don’t just hear, listen. Let them know that you are listening by maintaining eye contact. It’s been said that nearly 80% of our communication is nonverbal.
- Understand their feelings. Be considerate with how these people feel and let them know that you respect it, but you don’t necessarily need to accept it.
- Practice being compassionate. He’s sick. He’s uncomfortable. He’s frustrated. He’s frightened. Try to be in his shoe and absorb the issue that he may be dealing with.
- Stay composed. Don’t let anger eat you because if you do, you may be opening up the gate of ceaseless battles.
- Choose what words are appropriate to use. Remember, most of the time, they’ll not listen and you’ll just upset yourself more by trying to explain too much. Use short but concise words.
- Effectively document any important events. This will allow you to remain focused on what you need to do and this can increase the odds of a positive outcome.
- Inquire for many possible solutions. Ask others’ opinions and read behavioral books. Don’t give up!
While not all the mechanisms that you can use will work, remember to just continue in collecting a set of positive attitudes. Difficult people will not vanish, but take the better choice to not tail on that miserable dark alley.
Published at: 04/27/2015
