When Did We Stop?

“Will I lose my dignity? Will someone care? Will I wake tomorrow from this nightmare?” – Rent

When did we stop?

When did we stop being human?

When did we stop treating patients as if they were more than a disease/a problem to be solved?

When did we lose compassion – for the scared and lonely people?

We see you are overworked, tired, feeling inadequate…

But is that an excuse?

To treat patients and their families as if they are too much of a bother to care for?

Too much of a bother to treat their pain?

Too many patients – not enough time to care…

When did we stop caring about care?

That fearful old woman in a lonely ER bed doesn’t really want to bother you, but she can no longer perform the simplest functions without help – help that family has been banned from being able to perform due to new rules this new disease has imposed.

Tangled up in cords and wires, this once independent useful woman now is reduced to asking/begging for help from a virtual stranger just to use the bathroom – humiliated and degraded as she hopes for an answer to a call bell that gets ignored.

And you continue to ignore her plea for help as she rings the call bell a 5^th time, not even responding to her low oxygen level as it dips to the 60’s as she struggles to close the blinds for what little dignity she can manage to use the commode that she can barely get to

Because

You are too busy to care anymore

So, to the nurse taking care of our “nana” who didn’t think we were worth listening to on the phone

And to the respiratory therapist who tried to feed us half-truths

And the physician and nurse who spoke to us as if we were idiots with no medical knowledge or insight

We too are medical professionals with more knowledge than you gave us credit for

And we saw that you didn’t care enough to do the job right

So we want to know…

When did you stop listening?

When did you stop caring?

When did you stop…