Decided to become a nurse. Check.
Signed up for school. Check.
Applied to volunteer at the hospital...Check.
The time between leaving my job and going to school next month is ideal for volunteering. And with all of the volunteer openings, and budget cuts in health care...one would think that the hospital would be falling over itself to get help that is, in fact, FREE.
Just point me in the right direction, folks! I'll tuck in patients. I'll re-stock the shelves. I'll rock the babies. Sign me up!
So, why is it taking weeks just to get this volunteer gig set up at Big Named Regional Hospital? Don't they want and need my help? (Their website says they do!)
In my former life as a business person, this kind of unresponsiveness was the kiss of death. Which brings up a point that was driven home to me yesterday. A dear friend of mine, and business leader, is dealing with the health care system for a recent condition (fairly serious) which he has developed. He has been dealing with frustration due to unreturned phone inquiries, staff that don't remember who he is, delays in getting appointments and just running down rabbit holes trying to learn about how to take care of himself with this new condition. Very little is happening on the patient education side. I told him what I had learned...you really need to step up to be your own patient advocate, since they aren't going to come to you.
Knowing my former firm, which is known far and wide for hospitality and personal service, he finally exclaimed -- where is THAT kind of service in health care?! I nodded and commiserated with him, since I too have run up against this labyrinth we call health care when I have been a patient.
So now my mission is a little bit clearer. Call me an optimist, but I intend to apply what I have learned about good business, and apply it to my new role as a (future) nurse. I'm reading a lot of biographies about nursing and it's frustrations, and I'm ready to get in the game and do my bit to make things better.
Until they beat it out of me...
:D
I think the way to fix this dilemma is to make all health care private pay. I know this is radical! But then docs & hospitals would actually have to compete to have the best service like the rest of the world!
ReplyDeleteI'd like to see that!
ReplyDelete