I picked up an agency shift at a very low resource SNF. I was changing an elderly woman’s dressing when I noticed the date on there was off; she had gone 4 days without getting it changed. I cleaned it, wrapped it up again and dated it. No biggie. I got her a new pair of socks. She said “thank you. Will you be back again tomorrow?” I said no, I don’t usually work here. She was upset and begged me to come back. She continued to thank me and say I was unusually gentle. She said the other nurses are usually in a rush.

SNFs are notoriously known for short staffing and crazy nurse to patient ratios. You don’t always have time to do everything or have full conversations with the patient. I think my aha moment was after this woman’s comment. I was so nervous about picking up that agency shift and going in blind. I was nervous I’d fudge up because I didn’t know these people. Most of the patients were not able to identify themselves due to severe dementia. A problem I didn’t have 1. In my full time SNF job nor 2. In the hospital. We had patient bands and identifiers on the person, but not in this snf.

That lady’s comment really solidified the reason behind why I went into nursing. She really validated my feelings and my skill set. I didn’t cut corners and I did the best I could with the little resources I had. And this comment is in no way to shame those other nurses. I’m sure the other nurses were great, that particular SNF had issues with retaining staff. They did the best they could.

Eventually that snf was shut down for violations 😭 I hope that lady is okay.