"Staff attitude towards my loved one"

My loved one arrived at the Latrobe Regional Hospital ED in the early hours of the morning with an injury requiring orthopaedic surgery. The night nurse was wonderful. She was polite, attentive and caring. 

Unfortunately, following a shift change the standards dropped. 

I felt the nurse caring for my loved one was unprofessional in many of their interactions with my loved one and I believe with their co-workers. This nurse was unaware I was a nurse and when they next entered the cubicle, I expressed concern that my family member’s oxygen saturation’s were consistently desatting to 86-88% on room air (following coming back from a resus bay for reduction of the fracture under fentanyl and propofol). 

The nurse stated, well, it’s 92% now, and walked out. I did try to explain that I was having to keep my very drowsy family member awake to achieve 92-94% at best. It went unheard. 

My family member was a high risk of compartment syndrome and the doctor ordered half-hourly neurovascular observations which were done approximately 1-2 hourly. 

My loved one remained tachycardic between 115-130bpm following the reduction. Ward staff came to collect my loved one from the emergency department and the bedside handover was appalling, in my opinion. So unprofessional! This nurse stated that my loved one had received a sh** tonne of pain relief - in my opinion, considering the extent of the injury, IV 5mg Morphine and PO 5mg Oxycodone isn’t really a large amount over the 7 hours they were within the department.

The ward nurse was hesitant to take my loved one with such a high heart rate and explained to the emergency department nurse that without altered criteria, my loved one would be requiring a MET call on the ward. The ED nurse was so unprofessional in my opinion and seemed to be belittling towards this nurse who was advocating for their patient. This nurse threw their arms in the air, stormed off in a huff, and in my opinion, their tone was very rude. They returned and maintained that my loved one's fine for the ward. They're ready.

It was so disappointing to see someone speak to a co-worker that way when they are being completely reasonable and advocating for their patient. Thankfully, my loved one reports a nicer experience on the ward, but we were both left extremely disappointed by the lack of empathy and professionalism demonstrated. These two individuals certainly didn’t uphold LRH’s core values.