Pricey Hospital Gowns

A nurse from another unit came over asking to borrow a paper gown. Her patient had been discharged and had no clothes. "They" don't like us to send patients home in cloth gowns because of the expense, so we're expected to use paper gowns. The problem was, none of the units had paper gowns.

I suggested that she just send the patient home in a cloth gown. That upset her, so I assured her that we do it all of the time. I explained if "they" want us to send patients home in paper gowns, then "they" should make sure that we have them.

We can't send patients home naked. We could just wrap them in a sheet like they're going to a toga party, but that would cost more than a gown.

The nurse was still quite upset. Finally, she said, "But the gowns costs sixty dollars."

I couldn't help but laugh. The gowns cost about six dollars. I've seen wedding dresses for less than sixty bucks. How she could think a backless, cheaply constructed hospital gown could cost that kind of money is pretty funny.

The patient went home in a cloth gown. Although, to be honest, all of my patients without clothes go home in cloth gowns. I don't think it's nice to send people out the door in just a piece of paper.

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I needed a little retail therapy today, so I went to a couple of my favorite stores. I tried, I really did, but I couldn't find a single thing to buy. There was lots of stuff for sale, but nothing interested me.

I need to do retail therapy with Sarah. When we would shop together, we practically cleaned out the stores and couldn't fit all of the stuff in our cars.

Since Sarah moved away, I'm not having as much fun shopping, but I'm saving a lot more money. Or, at least I was before Kelsey got sick.

Lacking anything better to do, I tried on fancy party dresses. I have no occasion to wear dresses like that, but I thought it would be fun. It wasn't, the lighting was too harsh and my appearance depressed me. When are stores going to get smart and put flattering lighting in their dressing rooms? They would sell so much more that way.

Anyway, none of the gowns, not even the beaded or full taffeta dresses cost more than fifty dollars. I wonder if it has ever occurred to that nurse who thinks hospital gowns cost sixty dollars if the hospital might save money by dressing the patients in formal evening wear?

Is It Hot Where You Are Too?

I don't mean to brag, because it's probably hot where you are too, but while driving around the Valley yesterday, the temperature got up to 113 degrees.

The above photo was taken from the Sepulveda Pass, coming down into the San Fernando Valley. What is really making this place a Hell-hole is the humidity. See the clouds? That's not typical with this kind of heat in LA. (Please excuse the dirt and bugs on the windshield.)

At least my air conditioner is working better than ever. Eddie, the air conditioner guy, did a great job, saved me eight thousand dollars and got the work done fast. If I had gone with Sears, I would still be waiting for them to get to me and much poorer.

This photo was taken in Culver City on the banks of Ballona Creek. Lovely, isn't it? It's nice to see how they improved on nature by lining the creek with concrete and removing the unsightly trees and grass that once must have grown along its banks. Heaven forbid that a creek should be allowed to remain in its natural state.

What I was doing in Culver City is getting Kelsey his chemo. The chemo he's getting rarely has any side effects in dogs and so far he's doing well. If that changes, then I will re-think his treatment plan. He might have as much as a year left, but there are no guarantees.

The people at the cancer center are very nice and use correct terminology. For example, I'm known as Kelsey's mom and he is referred to as my baby. The vet even kissed him on top of the head on his boo-boo. The kindness helps so much at this difficult time.

Sony Studios is just a few blocks from the vet's office and I have to drive by it. That's where Jeopardy and Wheel are taped. I keep hoping I'll see Alec Trebec or Vanna White wandering around outside. You never know, they might want to go to the El Pollo Loco across the street. I'll keep my camera handy when I drive by there, just in case.

Culver City, by the way, was only 80 degrees. I guess that's a major reason why people like to live in the crowded, expensive west side.

Internet Pay Stubs

Something new has started. Every other Tuesday, a few minutes past midnight, I get an e-mail from Hawaii. It's from the payroll department telling me that I can view my new pay stub on the Internet. The paper pay stubs used to come from Pasadena. (Why did payroll get to go to Hawaii and I didn't?)

This is my employer's way of saving money. They don't want to go to all of the expense of actually giving us a paper copy of our pay stub, so they just post it on the Internet instead. I'm fine with it being available on the net, but I also want a paper copy. Yes, I know I could print my own copy if my printer was working, but I like getting the little blue, folded piece of paper at work. I like the process of having it handed to me. It's tradition. It feels good.

Since many of the nurses can't navigate the Internet, I'll probably have to help them see their records and print copies for them at work. They could have jumped through the same hoops I did to still get a blue paper copy, but now the deadline has passed.

It's old-fashioned, but I'm still going to get my little blue copy. I'm getting nagging e-mails asking me to cancel my request and I'm feeling a little guilty, but I don't think it's too much to ask to be handed a little piece of paper. Somehow, it just doesn't feel like I have been paid unless I'm handed something.

The Real Thing

The hospital caught on fire today. Just about the time I was leaving my house for work, one of the doctors went into one of the patient's rooms. As soon as he opened the door, smoke billowed out.



The patient was pulled out of the room, the door was slammed shut and a code red was announced. That is our protocol, PCAE. That means:



P-patient rescue

C-contain the fire

A- alarm

E-evacuate



Oh, I forgot to mention the evacuation part. No one can ever recall us ever evacuating before, but that is what happened. Smoke was rapidly filling the unit, so it was quickly decided to get the patients out.



The people who could walk were escorted to the other side of the fire doors. The people who couldn't walk were left behind. It sounds heartless, but we have to save the largest numbers of people possible and that means saving ambulatory patients first. Had the emergency worsened, I'm sure they would have gone back to save at least some of the bedridden patients. I think.



It was later determined that the fire was caused by a short in the wiring. No flames were ever seen, but it produced a ton of smoke. The engineers hopefully fixed the problem.



I do have a couple of concerns. Despite all of the smoke, the smoke detectors never alarmed. Perhaps they are just heat detectors. If so, that doesn't seem safe because as it was, we could have lost a patient to smoke inhalation and had a big fire before we even knew anything was going on in the patient's room.It was pure chance that someone went in the room and discovered the smoke before it was too late.



My second concern is that the firefighters never arrived. I know that we have false code reds several times a day, but what happens when there really is a fire? Does that mean we are on our own if there is a fire?



The crisis was over by the time I got to work. My shift was boring. Boring is good.

Introducing Bear

Sarah has a new dog, a Newfoundland. She drove all the way to Yuma, Arizona to rescue him from a dog pound. His name is Bear. He is still a baby and growing and growing. There have been some behavior issues with the other dogs, but things are starting to work out. These things take time.

A Set-Back

The vet called with bad news. Kelsey's cancer has spread to the liver. Radiation is no longer an option, so we're left with chemo. It's not a cure, but would buy some more time. We have an appointment on Wednesday with the oncologist, so hopefully, I will have more information then about how much time he has.

I know that life isn't fair, but this is so not fair.

More Kelsey Stuff

The results of Kelsey's scans and labs are back and they look good. We're just waiting for the pathology reports for the biopsies. There is just one problem. Kelsey has a rock in his stomach.

This has happened before. A few years back, he was vomiting uncontrollably, so I took him to the vet. The vet wanted to take a wait and see approach, but I insisted on an x-ray. It showed not one, but two rocks in his tummy. He was given fish flavored vaseline-like stuff to eat and the rocks passed.

Apparently, Kelsey is up to his old tricks. If the rock doesn't pass, then he will need major surgery.

His thyroid level is also low, but that is corrected easily with medication. Kelsey's regular vet told me his thyroid level was fine when it was tested at my insistence a couple of months ago. The cancer center, which got copies of his medical records, looked at the same lab results and said his thyroid level was one-quarter of a normal level. The regular vet has some explaining to do.

The Work-Up

The plan is for Kelsey to receive radiation for his skin cancer. But he has to be staged first to make sure that it hasn't spread. There is no point in radiation unless the cancer appears to still be localized. If it has spread, chemo might buy him some time, but there is no cure.

He had all of his tests today and the results should be back by Monday. They couldn't control Kelsey and so they had to put him under general anesthesia in order to do the tests. They acted surprised that was necessary. I'm surprised that other dogs wouldn't put up a fight if strangers started sticking them with needles. It's probably just as well that he didn't feel the pain of the tests. And, I admire Kelsey's fighting spirit, even if it did cost me a couple hundred extra dollars.

The real problem was that he was slow to come out of the anesthesia and I needed to take him home in order to get to work on time. I waited as long as I could until there simply wasn't a choice. I needed my dog back now. Reluctantly, they carried Kelsey out to me and I then carried him to the car. I set him down to open the door and he jumped in. The car was all he needed to recover. A little motivation goes a long ways.

They shaved Kelsey's tummy, so now his private parts are fully exposed. The fur used to hide all of that. I'm wondering if I should put panties on him, so he doesn't feel so exposed.

Eddie, The Heating And Cooling Guy

I got another estimate to replace my air conditioner. Eddie was recommended by Lindsay who had some work done by him. Eddie took only ten minutes to figure out what I needed and then left. He called me later with an estimate of twenty-five hundred dollars for a top of the line model. Sears wanted over ten thousand and annoyed me with a two hour visit.

Eddie can do the job this week. Sears wouldn't be able to get to me for three weeks. Guess who got the job? It pays to shop around.

Eddie believed me when I told him the square footage of my house. Sears spent an hour measuring my house and then over-estimated it by five hundred square feet.

Eddie can simply remove my old compressor and hook up a new one. Sears said I needed a bigger unit which in turn required extensive construction to make it work with my existing system. Sears was going to do a huge two day job. Eddie can do it in two hours.

Eddie won't ask for any money until the job is done. How badly can this go?

No Morgue And Missing In Action

To no one's surprise, the opening of the new hospital has been delayed again. We're now looking at late November or Early December. I'm betting on next March.

There is one particularly odd thing about the new hospital; there is no morgue. We don't know if they forgot or if they just don't think that anyone is going to die. We're good, but we're not that good. So, what do they expect us to do with all of the dead bodies?

I mentioned this to a coworker and she asked if the new hospital has a basement and I said no. She replied, that is why there is no morgue. Morgues have to go in basements. I'm not making this up.

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We lost a patient today. I don't mean that the patient died, I mean that we couldn't find her. We were too busy at the time to really care, but the lab tech who came to draw her blood was seething. The recovery room told here that the patient had been sent up to us a long time ago and we were insisting that the patient must still be in the recovery room because we hadn't seen her.

The tech needed to draw the blood and she was being given the run-around. She made several more trips back and forth between our departments and was starting to behave like a cat caught in the sprinklers. She was sure that someone was lying to her and she was irate.

The patient had just had her hip replaced, so it seemed unlikely that she got up and walked out. Eventually, it was noticed that the orderly was missing also. Now that both had gone missing, none of this was making any sense. Had we not been so busy, this would have been an entertaining mystery to try and solve. As it was, though, we didn't especially care.

Nearly an hour later, the missing patient and orderly were found in the elevator.

Maybe The Heat Isn't So Bad

My air conditioner is broken and since the unit is 24 years old, it seemed like a good idea to just replace the unit. Wanting to deal with a large reputable company, I called Sears for an estimate. Are you laughing yet?

I have central air and it is the compressor that is broken. I was prepared for an estimate of maybe one or two thousand dollars. The estimate was for over ten thousand dollars, although, in their kindness, they offered me a ten percent discount if I signed the contract on the spot. High pressure sales techniques like that don't work well on me.

Needless to say, I will be getting other estimates. I think he over-estimated the square footage of my home by 500 square feet. That put me in a larger compressor category, which requires a larger concrete pad and other upgraded stuff. The building code has also changed and according to him, everything else I have related to heating and cooling would have to be modified accordingly.

I also had a hard time getting him to leave. He was there for two hours, during which time I took a shower, got dressed for work and put make-up on. Finally, I was standing there in my scrubs, telling him I had to leave for work and he was still applying the thumbscrews, trying to get me to sign the contract. I'm not wishy-washy. I told him several times that I needed to think about it for a few days, but he didn't want to take no for an answer. He had no choice, though, my answer was no.

Now, I'm afraid to let anyone else in my house to give me another estimate. I do not want to go through that again. It looks like the heat spell inside my house is going to be going on much longer than expected.

Raid v. Pam For Cooking

I was in the mood for buttermilk pancakes, so I decided to make some. To try and save calories, I was going to use Pam to grease the pan. I grabbed the can and almost started to spray when something didn't seem quite right.

It was Raid. The cans are quite similar, don't you think?

I'm having a major ant problem. It's that time of year, so I like to keep a can of Raid handy. It may have been a little too handy.

The pancakes turned out fine. They were slightly burnt just the way I like them. My dad grew up on burnt pancakes and that's how he fixed them for me. He burned them on purpose because that's what tasted good to him. I'm continuing the tradition. Burnt pancakes taste like love.

Big, Long And Cold

It's not quite done, but I got my first peek at our new hospital. I worked last night and had to be back early the next morning for my new hospital orientation. On four hours sleep, I was so tired I felt like I might vomit. That could have influenced my impression, but I'm not loving the new hospital. The corridors are soooo long. I'm really hoping that we are allowed to wear roller skates or use skate boards.

Our current hospital has each unit built in a circle with the nurse's station in the middle and the rooms around the outside circle. It's small, old and cramped, but at least we don't have to walk far.

The patients will probably be happier in the new hospital, though, because the rooms are large and almost all private. And, I am happy that the wards are gone. If one person wants something in a ward, then everybody else wants it too. A ward with four people in it is ten times more work than four private rooms, especially if it's women in the ward.

We had to dress like construction workers for the orientation. It all seemed quite silly. The building no longer looks like it's under construction. The orange vest, hard-hat and hard shoes seemed like over-kill.

The shoes were a problem for many of the nurses. Most people around here wear tennis shoes or sandals. That's all that many people own. Rather than have to buy some ugly man-shoes that would never be worn again, some of the nurses wore their husband's shoes. They were several sizes too big and resembled clown shoes, but it got them past the shoe inspection.

At least the air conditioner works in the new building. The old hospital is stuffy and hot on days like this. The patients all complain and beg for fans that we don't have. The new hospital feels like a meat locker. I'm not sure how that's going to work out.

When I got home, I had beer, potato chips, ice cream and chocolate for dinner. For some reason, that didn't help. I'm still tired. Tomorrow, it's back to fruit and kefir.

Safe From Killer Koi

This is MacKenzie on guard duty. She's protecting us from the fish. If one dares come to the surface, she growls and barks. Kelsey doesn't care about the fish, but he likes to keep her company while she is on duty.

They're getting along better now. MacKenzie will now allow Kelsey to sniff her bottom as long as he doesn't linger too long. She used to growl if he even looked at her. We're making progress.

MacKenzie works long hours. I respect her work ethic. Not many people would be willing to work so hard for only room and board. Kelsey enjoys the opportunity to spend time with his girlfriend.

Since the air conditioner broke and the weather turned so hot, she has been perching on the rocks with her front legs in the water. Smart dog.

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I got up early this morning to take Kelsey to the vet to have his sutures removed. I had also planned on getting a copy of the pathology report to take to an oncologist. When I drove into the parking lot, I was greeted by a large closed sign on the building. The vet is on vacation this week. I guess my appointment is for next Tuesday, not this Tuesday.

Kelsey cried so much when I pulled into the lot that I thought he had hurt himself. He's not a crier by nature, so I examined him, but he was fine. The poor dear was just scared. We turned around and left, much to Kelsey's joy.

It was time for the sutures to come out. In another week they would be more difficult to remove and cause Kelsey more pain, so I removed them myself. He was such a good boy about that. Now we have to wait another week.

The VIP

The VIP is now in our unit and wouldn't you know it, she was assigned to me. I was charge nurse and could have refused her, but it would have been ugly, so I stoically accepted her. It's not that she is a bad patient, it's just that no one likes to be scrutinized so carefully. I'm also not comfortable doing highly personal things to people I know. For example, if I have to catheterize someone, I would prefer that they be a complete stranger, not my boss.

She was on special sheets with a thick, poofy comforter that were purchased for her. They were bought not by us, but by our sister unit down the hall. We call them sip sips. An American word for it is brown-nosers. I try hard to treat everyone the same whether they are rich and powerful or live under a bridge. It just seems wrong for nurses to buy sheets for a wealthy patient. It also bothers me that people don't know or care when other people are kissing up to them.

Anyway, before I left, I asked the night charge nurse to be sure and assign the VIP to the day shift charge nurse. She's the one who assigned her to me. It's payback time.

New Floor Photos

This is my new floor.

See what a pretty, sunny day it was today? It's like that everyday. It was also very hot today. Notice, also, how the afternoon sun shines through my house? Most of all, see that the door is open? That is a very bad sign. It means that the air conditioner is broken.

So, now I have a collapsed bathroom ceiling, a sick dog and a broken air conditioner during the hottest time of the year. Yeah, life is good.


This is the view of the other side of the room. There is now a huge area rug on this part of the floor. I put it there for Tommy. He has a wooden floor phobia and won't walk on wood floors. That means I have to lay down Tommy rugs, so that he can walk through the house. He'll actually jump from rug to rug. It's cute, but also sad.

Lindsay and I went shopping over the weekend and I found this Chinese antique table in a store in Santa Monica. It's not really an antique, I can't afford one of those. This is a new table that has been made to look old and battered. It seems funny to me that I had to buy a new table because I can't afford an old one.

It's kind of fun to buy furniture. I've had little experience doing that. Almost everything I own has been passed down to me from either my grandmother or parents. I really can't complain about that, but there is something to be said for buying furniture that is in my own taste.

The Biopsy Results

Kelsey has skin cancer. The margins are clear, but because the tumor is on top of the head, there wasn't enough skin to remove the recommended amount of borders. He has mast cell tumor which is a very aggressive type of cancer. It can metastasize, so his prognosis is unpredictable.

I don't know what I'm going to do. There are a number of treatments. It just depends on how aggressive I want to be and how much I am willing to put Kelsey through.

It is times like this that I wish I didn't have dogs. Dogs bring so much joy and so much pain.

Locked Inside My Car

There is a mock commercial circulating on the Internet about some poor, frantic blond who locks herself inside her car and can't get out. She is told to lift up the little knob on the door and is relieved to be free from her prison.

I thought that the joke was funny until today, when it happened to me. While driving, I had accidentally hit the master switch that locked all of the doors. It wasn't my fault. It was the fly's fault. I was trying to lower the windows so it could escape and not wanting to take my eyes off the road, I just felt around for the button. Naturally, I hit the wrong button.

I figured that if I could find the master locking button, I could hit it again and unlock all of the doors. I either didn't find the right button or it didn't work in reverse, the result being the same, I was locked inside my car.

It was hot outside and with the engine off, my car was heating up rapidly. I looked around for a little knob on top of the door to lift up, but there weren't any. My anxiety level was rising. I was going to die from heat exhaustion. Then I noticed the toggle switch next to the door handle. I hit it and the door unlocked. It's not easy going through life blond.

Earthquake Present

Last night I dreamed that while lying in bed, there was an earthquake. The next morning my mom called and asked if I felt the earthquake. I had no idea it really happened. It seemed like just another dream. I hope this doesn't mean that the tsunami happened too.

When I came to work, I saw our earthquake present, a half-dozen new flashlights. They give us that after every earthquake. It's nice, but it would be better if they gave us the flashlights before earthquakes.

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My new floor is almost done. I just need to install two more thresholds and a sealing coat and it will be done, I think. I'm still playing with some of the cracks. If you don't look too closely, the floor looks good. Of course, I know where all of the problem areas are, so my eyes go straight to them. That's one of the disadvantages of doing the work myself. Now, I just have to decide if I will do the kitchen too.

Another Day At The Beach

This is Malibu. Zuma to be more precise. It was also hot, but except for our tootsies, Lindsay and I didn't go in the water. I didn't go in because I hate cold water and forgot my wetsuit.


Lindsay didn't go in because of this. See the lifeguard boat? That's used for collecting the people who get caught in riptides and are swept out to sea.

The last time we body surfed, we got caught in a riptide. I was able to swim out of it, but Lindsay had to be rescued. Not by the boat, but by a lifeguard who swam out and dragged him back. Now, Lindsay doesn't want to go in the water.

This is just some girl with a bushy-bushy blond hairdo. (Does the wind ever stop blowing at the beach?)

Poor Kelsey

Kelsey had to go to the vet to have a tiny growth removed from the top of his head. This is how how he was returned to me.

Special Treatment

I hate meetings. It goes beyond being a waste of time, they simply suck the life force out of me.

No one has meetings when all is going well. Meetings are called when something is wrong and the misery needs to be shared.

For several years, I was able to avoid meetings because they were on my day off. That was a valid excuse for skipping a meeting. But, we have a new manager and she changed the meeting schedule. They are all on my days to work. I dealt with that problem by scheduling my vacations and extra days off for meeting times, but I can only get so many days off and it finally happened that I got stuck with having to attend a meeting.

There are so many things to hate about the meetings, but the worst part has to be where we are shown the complaints that patients have made about us. They hate us, they really do. They hate the dirty, small, hot crowded rooms and the cold, inedible food. They hate that the nurses and doctors are so rushed. The English speaking patients hate it that they can't understand the foreign nurses. The Spanish speaking patients hate it that the nurses and doctors don't speak Spanish. (We have translators, but that's not good enough. They want us to speak Spanish. I'm kind of thinking that maybe after 20 or 30 years in this country, they should learn some English.)

The meeting dragged on for an eternity. The grand finale was the news that a major bigwig in the hospital is soon going to be a patient in my unit. Oh joy. She is expecting that we will buy her special sheets and fill her room with flowers because that is what another unit did the last time she was a patient there.

That strikes me as just being wrong. Of course we should do our best to take good care of her, but since she is partly responsible for running the hospital and our budget, perhaps this would be the perfect opportunity to see what it is really like to be a patient in our hospital. Maybe if she discovers just how bad the food is and what a run-down dump this place is, she might be motivated to do something. Maybe then, we might get fewer negative patient reviews.

So, what do you think? Should she get the V.I.P. treatment or be treated like every other patient?