Phlebotomists are Vampires or I'm Not Dead Yet Cancer Update or Nurses Rule

Yep, not dead yet. The surgery apparently went well and while I am in pain and getting used to my new body (The bits they took out were fairly important. The options left behind take some work to replace the traitor bits we took out), I am largely able to function. I am still wiped out, so I am not sure how much I will write in the next week or two. But I wanted to give an update and thank everyone for the good wishes.

And whine about hospitals.

Hospitals do not appear designed to help you get better. Hospitals appear to be run on the premise that their job is to keep you from dying long enough that you are in no immediate danger and go home, where the real healing is expected to take place. In my case, I was told that rest and walking would be the best means of recuperating. Both were just this side of impossible in the hospital.

The hospital constantly interrupted me with tests. The Phlebotomists would come at 4:30 in the morning, every morning to draw blood. Vitals were taken very early every morning, and medicine give on schedules that required me to be woken up in the middle of the night. Add in the various machines you are hooked up to and the fact that less than dark out curtains mean the hallway light shines through like a dim sun, and sleep only happed in fits and starts.

Walking was jsut as hard. Aside from the difficulties the surgery itself engendered, I was hooked up to an IV and a heart monitor, the brains of which I had to carry with me. It made walking difficult and taking care of myself almost impossible.

All this was done on the doctors’ schedule, so that they had information when they came to talk to me around 6 or 6:30 in the morning. It made it easy for them to discuss my situation. Except I have almost no memories of those discussion because they woke me up in the middle of sleep each time, when I was in pain and exhausted. If it wasn’t for the nurses and technicians, I would literally have no idea what happened to me.

Nurses are underpaid and underappreciated. The doctors do not care for you, or at least are not the primary gave providers after the surgery. Nurses are the ones that made me conformable. Nurses are the ones that tried to align the various tests and medicine delivery so that I had some chance at sleep. Nurses negotiated with the docs to give me some pills rather than another IV. Nurses explained to me how the surgery went and what to expect in the short term. Nurses volunteered to go on walks with me, in case I fell or had a bad moment. Nurses are the reason I am home rather than in the hospital.

None of this is novel, of course, but reminders help. When the nurses go on stroke to get better pay and better working conditions, remember to support them. The inevitably deserve what they are asking for. And having more nurse attention on single patients makes all of us healthier.