Hospital Blues

I remember when being in the hospital meant that you would receive one on one personal care from the hospital staff. You were assigned a nurse who catered to your ailments and whose goal it was to make you comfortable. There was so much paperwork that had to be written, analyzed, documented and filed.

As I sit in the hospital room where my mom is a patient, I watch as she is being poked at and prodded. I'm thinking about how far a stay in the hospital has progressed. There's no longer just a nurse. There's also a nurse's assistant. A specialist comes in to draw blood. Another checks the vitals. Information is now typed into a computer that requires a login w/picture id and a password. There is also a person who wears a green vest with the word support on it. Their function is to walk around and assist the staff with any questions or difficulties related to the computer system.

Each activity related to a patients care is updated into the computer (typically as soon as the activity is completed).  There are so many people that make up the nursing staff. Watching as they all tried to get in the room to do their part was interesting. Amazingly, my mom's care wasn't jeopardized. The only frustration was that only certain "staff members" were able to provide updates on my moms progress &, of course, these members were very busy, often delaying the response time to questions.

Modern medicine and hospital stays have come a long way and I appreciate the progress. Overall, although I may have the hospital blues, my mom is holding her own and for that life is good.