The Funny Stuff

I have been thinking……if nursing is so bad, why do I keep at it?? The answer is obvious to me: there are people out there who need my help. It’s that simple, and that difficult.

I just got off the phone with my friend, Marsha. She and I have worked together a couple of times in our careers. About a million years ago, we were both “office nurses” at the local medical clinic. More recently, we both worked in the Operating Room. Marsha is still there, still complaining about it, and still doing a good job.

I told her about my day from hell yesterday. More than any of my other close friends, Marsha can empathize; she is knee-deep in the muck called regulations, too. She shared some of the crap she has been through this week and helped me put my own crap in perspective.

I don’t get to talk to Marsha all that often. The last time we talked was about 3 months ago, at a baby shower. I haven’t seen her since. As always, we just start talking as if there was no time lapse in between conversations. Before the conversation goes very far, we are both laughing and remembering the funny stuff. Maybe that is why I called her today: I needed a dose of the funny stuff.

We spent a few minutes playing “catch up” about everybody; who’s still in the OR, who’s moved on, etc. Other people might call it gossiping, we call it “catching up.” Not a lot of changes in the last three months so, we moved on to reminiscing about the “good old days.”

Working in the OR is very stressful. Dealing with life and death situations takes a toll on everybody. The thing I always liked best about the operating room was the camaraderie among the staff and physicians. Look at a single operating room, if you will: there is a patient, in the middle of the room, a circulating nurse, a scrub nurse or tech, a surgeon, and an anesthesiologist. It is a microcosm of what healthcare should be: the patient is in the middle, surrounded by a group of skilled professionals, all focused on the needs of the patient.

Each member of the operating room team has a specific function and more importantly, every member of the team needs every other member of the team. They work together, each bringing their own expertise to the table, literally, and enhancing the activities of the other team members.

The surgeon might think that he is the most important member of the team; all the rest of us would argue that point. No one of us could perform the operation without the others; we need each other. If only it were that obvious everywhere else in the healthcare world!

The camaraderie in the operating room is borne of that need for teamwork. Surgeons are frequently addressed by their first names by others in the operating room. Social boundaries are blurred: a surgeon may be asking the OR tech for advice on purchasing a bicycle, or skis, or traveling to the Bahamas. We take breaks together. We play practical jokes on each other.

As OR charge nurse, I was in and out of all the operating rooms all day long, planning surgeries, coordinating staff and equipment use, and “guess-timating” surgery schedules. The staff gave me a wrist watch that had “1-ish” “2-ish” “3-ish”etc. on it for the numbers…….that’s how “ish” it got.

One day, as I walked in Cliff’s room, he was just completing a laparoscopic cholecystectomy. Unfortunately for me, he had the irrigating trocar in his hand and proceeded to soak me with it. Drenched, I had to go change scrubs.

By the time I was back in the OR, Cliff was in the next room, getting ready to do another surgery. He was talking to his assistant, facing the other direction, when I came into the room. Connie, the OR tech winked at me as I tied Cliff into his surgical gown. He didn’t turn around to see who was tying him, and he didn’t stop talking to the assistant. Just before I handed him the card so he could tie his gown in front, I took my scissors out of my pocket and cut the cord that was holding his scrub pants up. I then handed him the card and left the room quickly.

About 10 minutes later, I heard him yell something like “I’ll get you for this!” Funny, nobody in that room could remember who came in and tied his gown for him. Didn’t matter: he knew who it was.

At the completion of that surgery, he walked with the patient and gurney into the Recovery Room. He talked one of the Recovery Room nurses into calling me and asking me to come to the Recovery Room stat. Of course, I ran right in there, fully expecting a code to be in progress. Instead, I was greeted by Cliff, syringe full of K-Y jelly hidden behind his back. Not for long: it was soon dripping out of my hair and down my back.

Tired of changing scrubs, I decided to go home. The OR schedule was complete for the day and all our patients were neatly tucked in, so it was a good time to leave.

Before leaving, I stopped in my office long enough to call my friend Vicki—the surgeon who shared a medical office with Cliff—and asked her for a favor. “Anything for you, Sis, what is it?” she asked. “Could you rearrange Cliff’s office a little bit?” Based on the laughter at the other end of the phone, I knew my work was done for the day.