day 15

Happy Halloween!

This week i believe i've had a really good taste of the politics of this facility. Some nurses believe they are the top of the world and it is obvious that some carers believe that physios don't do any good and we should leave the residents alone and let them just lay around and die. I just don't think some of the carers realise that if older people don't walk/join X classes/do anything they will decondition a lot quicker. It was very annoying to hear snide comments by some people today who believed they knew what was right when they bearly have any qualifications. 

But i guess you do get the good with the bad so it was really nice to see one bed bound patient (Mrs C) being wheeled around today in a Princess chair. This is the first time she has been up for a year! Tim and I do daily passive mvmts with Mrs C as she has an awful flexion fetal posture which she is very tight in. Today was the first time i've heard Mrs C say anything bar "Yeeeeeeeaaahhh" and "Nooooooooo".  She seemed really happy to be out of her room and breathing fresh air next to the bird cage and in the sun room. She even complied with her passives easier today as one of the conditions Liz the carer told her if she was going to get out of bed was that she had to keep her legs straight. And you could tell she really tried!

Also as Tim was off sick today, it was only Trudy and me in. Trudy's really good with letting Tim and I do the physio work and listens to what we have to say about the patients and our ideas about improving their X's or anything/everything. Today I took over house 2 (my fav house) X's which I enjoyed having that responsibility. There was a bit that concerned me at the end of the session when they all wanted tea but I had to leave to go back and do paper work before my day was over. This made me feel uneasy as I had to leave the residents unattended when I felt I really wanted to be supervising them until they got back into their rooms. I discussed my feelings with Trudy and an OTA and they told me that I just have to judge the situation for myslef and reminded me that those residents in low care should be independant themselves as they are not expected to be watched 24/7 and that they walk around making tea for themselves all the time. In hindsight i still wish i had stayed there and especially watched Mr D get back to his room safely especially with his history of falls.