to think my sister is way out of line doing this to the nursing staff

[frecer]

My brother is in hospital at the moment and I went to see him tonight, when I got there my sister was at the nurse's desk firing a series of questions at the nursing staff. Dsis is a GP (though only qualified for a couple of years) and she was asking medically related questions (about medication and his medical notes etc) but her reaction to them was so rude as the nurses did not know or were not providing her with all the detail she wanted to know.

As she was leaving, I didn't really speak to her but when I got home DP thinks its natural and that its probably a good thing as he is quite a quiet 20 year old guy and so she is keeping them on their toes whilst I think its really rude.

So to summarise:

• Your brother has given consent for your sister to be his advocate throughout his care

• Your sister has both the technical knowledge and recent ward experience

• You didn't hear the whole conversation

I think it's safe to say YABU, OP

my friend had to question the nurses and look closely at her dh notes to make sure his care was appropriate. wards are very very busy places and your SIL is doing her best to get appropriate care for your DB.
you should back her not criticise her.

I'm sorry your brother is ill but this comes across as more of an issue between you and your sister than about his care. If I were ill I'd want someone advocating for me and if they were medically qualified all the better. Do you think that because you're worried and feelings are raw that perhaps you might be allowing sibling rivalry to colour your views. Hope he recovers quickly.

All very well to say the sister should come back at a better time but as a junior GP she'll be working.

V difficult to comment as you didn't hear the conversation and we can't be sure of the questions/ your sister's manner/the nurses responses.

Assuming that your brother has given his consent for her to be given all of his medical information (not sure if you have stated this), your sister is reasonable to ask questions if she is worried or aspects of his care are unclear. It's understandable that she would want him to have the best care and sometimes mistakes are made or reasons for decisions are unclear. However, she should know, as someone who has until recently worked in hospitals, that nurses frequently don't have the answers. Instead of getting cross/ frustrated with the nursing staff, it would be much more productive to be very polite and friendly and ask for the doctors to give her a call after their ward round or to leave a message with the consultant's secretary for him/ her to call her. (I assume that she works full time so wouldn't be able to be around for ward rounds).

I'm a GP who has spent years working in hospital and have a husband who is still in hospital medicine so understand v well how the system works. Staff are often v busy, often agency nursing staff who don't seem to know much, nurses are often unable/ unwilling to give out a lot of information, communication skills of doctors is often poor (due to huge time constraints and far too many patients plus poor example set by some senior doctors/ managers). She should know all this and be clever rather than rude/ upsetting staff.

I think peppermintfondant puts the point across that I was trying to make.

There are more easier times to find out information, and as a GP she should know this. In the evening when it's possibly the night shift with less nurses, one doctor on call who may not know the patient and possibly agency staff who won't know the history, is not the best time to ask questions about someone's care.

I'm not saying nursing staff shouldn't know, as a nurse I will answer questions any time of day obviously, but it's better to get answers during the day when people are around. Communication from Doctors is often lacking. And yes she could phone the ward.