Dangerous Emergency Admission - Money can't buy me love!

Why the hell did I agree to do the night shift at the Sunshine Nursing Home? The only night shift I usually do finishes at the kebab house with a massive student special with extra chilli sauce. 

Charisma from the Nursing Agency rang me at 4pm, just as I was about to settle into a very comfortable afternoon watching Tipping Point and dunking choc chip cookies in my builder’s tea. Apparently it was urgent and the manager at Sunshine Nursing Home had asked for me in person. Flattery will get you everywhere and before I knew it and against my better judgement, I said yes. 


That was it. My comfortable afternoon was over. I had been booked in for the night. 

I arrived bright and early at the home, and it was a very different feeling coming in of an evening. It was a bit weird seeing all the residents in their night clothes and getting ready for bed. I couldn’t believe how chilled it all was; everyone was quiet and the staff served hot chocolate and other drinks for the residents while they watched the 10 o’clock news. Shortly after that they all started trooping off to bed. 

I was just cleaning the med trolley after my round when the phone rang. It was the emergency social work team who said there was a resident that they needed to admit as a matter of urgency. I told them I was sure it would be ok and to call back after 9am when the Manager would be in. 

I was told in no uncertain terms that we had one remaining contract bed vacant and therefore to expect the admission within the hour.

I rang the Manager in a bit of a panic. She wasn’t bothered to be fair, said it had happened before and that it would just be a case of somewhere to sleep to keep them safe for a night or two. At least, I think that’s what she said; it was a bit noisy her end with someone shouting numbers and someone else screaming about a house. 

My new overnight guest arrived within half an hour. I’d made sure the room was ready and looked cosy and I opened the door to welcome them with a tray of hot chocolate and a plate of Fox’s finest. I needn’t have bothered. The tray flew out of my hands before the door had fully opened as the new resident was pretty much dragged in by two burly coppers and a bearded social worker carrying a bin bag full of belongings (what is it with female social workers and their aversion to hair removal cream???)

I led them to the waiting bedroom where my latest addition slammed the door shut on us and started to move the furniture. I tried the door but it seemed that he had barricaded himself in.

I turned round to speak to the Police officers only to find they had legged it out of the building quicker than Mo Farrah and had left me and Sheila the social worker to it. With an unsurprised sigh I turned to talk to her instead. She then went on to tell me what a lovely bloke he was, a ‘gentle little lamb’ was the exact phrase she used as she winced at the sound  

of a chest of draws being overturned in the already barricaded room, before dumping the paperwork on my lap and leaving as quickly as the Police officers.

I started to feel an urgent need for the toilet as I realised I was suddenly on my own. I was the nurse in charge, fully responsible for every decision with no other nurse or manager to fall back on. I could feel eyes boring into the back of my head and turned to see the hostile glares of the carers – as if any of this was my fault!!

Behind the barricaded door I could hear clanging and banging and shouts for the police, but I just couldn’t get into that room. I knocked, I called and I cajoled but there was no way he was letting me in. 

By this point, the other residents were starting to get cheesed off and were shouting for him to shut up (with a few extra words thrown in for good measure). I just couldn’t see what was happening in that room so I decided to go outside to see if I could see him from the street. I had to fight to get to the front of a huge crowd that was gathering at an alarming pace. They were pointing and nudging and one idiot was even recording it on his phone. I looked up and to my horror, my new resident was up on the window sill, dressed only in his Y fronts, shouting to the crowd to call the police. He hollered that he had been taken prisoner and that he would jump if he had to. 

I got really mad then. I told the spectators to go home (with a few extra words thrown in for good measure) and then I got on the phone. I was not equipped to deal with this and neither was Ernie, my distressed resident. He didn’t know why he was there and neither did I. He had been dumped….and I had been dumped on. I called the bearded lady and told her the situation had escalated quickly and to get her arse back to the home. Her lamb had turned into a lion and needed some support. I then called the Linford Christie and Usain Bolt of the local Police force (one was much older than the other) and ordered them to break the 100 metre record on their way back to sort this situation out, as he was at risk of harming himself. 

When they arrived, they managed to get into the room. The Manager will go nuts when she sees the state of the door but I couldn’t let poor Ernie work himself into an even wilder frenzy. I almost cried when I saw him there, perching on the window sill, shivering with just the curtain pulled round him. I told the others to leave while I tried to talk him down. Truth be told, I was scared too. I just didn’t know what to say so I just kept saying I was sorry we’d scared him and that I wouldn’t let anyone hurt him. Eventually he was just so exhausted he let me help him onto the bed. 

I checked Ernie before I left in the morning and I knew that he would feel just as frightened when he woke up. I’m going to speak to the Manager about dealing with stuff like this as none of us knew what to do and that’s not fair on anybody. Surely it’s not right that someone is moved in the middle of the night to a strange place? Where’s the policy to protect everyone in situations like this? There was no time for any real preparation or any consideration of whether we could meet his needs, which made it a totally unsafe admission. 

I’m getting more and more disillusioned with this agency stuff. Okay, the money’s good but if 

I’d been all about money I wouldn’t have chosen nursing. 

Time to really think about what I want out of this career.