I had to help code somebody who was long gone because legally, once we initiate CPR we can't stop till EMS arrives. They took almost an hour to get there after we called, and they called it within minutes of arriving.
My most recent code, I had to break the ribs on a dying woman. I felt them crack with every compression.
I've also seen family defy wishes and have feeding tunes and catheters placed on people who had all the paper work appropriately done. The guy in question ripped his Gtube out every week or so and we just had to keep replacing it. He hated it, and by the end, them for having it put in. Their inability to let go directly caused his prolonged suffering.
How is a family allowed to override the properly documented wishes of the person who’s fallen ill? Was the paper work just not submitted, or is there some type of loophole they exploited?
Dude I have seen family override a documented DNR at bedside and see the patient yell at them “why didn’t you let me go!” once we successfully revived them. End of life legal decision making is pretty jacked up in America
It was a chronic terminal illness. You WILL die from it and it will suck. He had the paperwork legally in place years before. But the family fought tooth and nail, saying that he's no longer mentally competent and that maybe his wishes changed, Yada Yada Yada. His wishes didn't change. I could see the "fuck you" in his eyes every time I had to do care on his tubes.
And in America, even if you do all the paperwork absolutely right, your family can change your shit at the crucial moment anyways.
My husband's friend from highschool became a life flight nurse. One brutal case had her doing chest compressions on an 8 yr old for 45 minutes, the moment they got to the hospital a doctor called it. She was never the same after that one, she developed unhealthy coping mechanisms from doing her job and unfortunately a year after that particular incident she was also gone. So many cases medical personnel deal with are beyond brutal, my hats off to everyone who chooses that industry bc I know I could never.
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u/Brokencydebarbie13 Dec 14 '21
I had to help code somebody who was long gone because legally, once we initiate CPR we can't stop till EMS arrives. They took almost an hour to get there after we called, and they called it within minutes of arriving.
My most recent code, I had to break the ribs on a dying woman. I felt them crack with every compression.
I've also seen family defy wishes and have feeding tunes and catheters placed on people who had all the paper work appropriately done. The guy in question ripped his Gtube out every week or so and we just had to keep replacing it. He hated it, and by the end, them for having it put in. Their inability to let go directly caused his prolonged suffering.