To think this nurse shouldn't have laughed / scoffed at me for asking for a room?

[supertrainers]

Last night at 3 am I had to take my DD to a and e as she was struggling with her breathing.

Unfortunately this coincided with me having been up all night already vomiting. Second night in a row. It's not a stomach bug, before anyone says I shouldn't have taken my child to the hospital.

I was feeling absolutely rotten. Two nights of no sleep, worry for my DD. Pain, nausea. Everything.

I'm familiar with the hospital as I have found myself many times in there with one of my children in the middle of the night.

Most of the time, we get offered a room, once we've been triaged. Not always, but more often than not. The room has a bed in it and we just stay in there and the doctors come in and out.

I said to the triage nurse last night that I was also feeling extremely unwell and are there any rooms we could possibly wait in. I said I'm sorry for asking and I wouldn't ask unless I really needed to.

She did a scoff / laugh at me for even asking. 9 times out of 10 we have a room and you scoff at me ? I was taken aback by it and in my horrible state for her to just laugh / scoff at me was super rude. I told her, I understand but I really don't appreciate you laughing at me for even asking. I'm really unwell and I wouldn't ask you. It's not very nice that you laughed.

She denied laughing at me. I left it at that and went and sat on the plastic chairs for 6 hours.

Maybe she watched the Channel 4 documentary last night about people waiting for up to 46 hours in a Fit to Sit area of A&E in hard back chairs.

I don't need to get into the personal details about why we need to go to a and e.

We have our reason and they're legitimate.

We stayed 6 hours for observations today. The wait to see the doctor wasn't that long at all today thankfully. But we needed to stay to be observed.

I'm not entitled, it's the way our a and e works and it's never usually a problem and no one scoffs or laughs at us.

I get the staff are under pressure but so are we.

I'm always extremely polite to everyone and I didn't deserve that today. End of.

YABU.

No, but op was and I for one believe she is in the best position to state what happened right in front of her face.

There's an awful amount of gaslighting going on here, not sure why but personally having a high medical needs child I have experienced more unacceptable and unprofessional behaviour from nurses than decent ones so I'm not in anyway surprised by what happened to op.

Nurses aren't saints, some are really lovely but a lot are just rude and I really don't care why, they need to be held accountable for poor behaviour.

@Crokepark by "room" the OP probably meant bed. The beds are all mostly in individual rooms in the children's A+E departments I've been in - plus a few beds with curtains.
If you get a bed - it essentially is a room.

OP, she’s only human.

On this occasion she wasn’t able to hold in a laugh at someone asking for a private room.

She didn’t deserve you reprimanding her.

If (if) she did laugh, she shouldn't have, very unprofessional, but when you've had to raise Hell after a very sick, immobile person who has vomited blood has been in an ambulance for 7 hours and then in a trolley in a corridor for 5 more, I find it hard to see that your expectations are reasonable.

The fact you weren't feeling great is of no interest to them.

So that concludes your version of the story.

@grapesstrawberriesplease no of course not. That wasn’t what I meant.

I’m surprised at the number of replies who feel the OP is somehow asking for something unreasonable or is being selfish, for asking for a bed (trolley) to lie on in the middle of the night when both she and her child are poorly and accessing medical care. This should be available.

I am a healthcare professional by the way. This state of affairs is not something we should be normalising.

A&E isn’t just ‘life threatening’ though, is it? Our minor injuries doesn’t deal with children under 13. We virtually had our own chair in A&E for a while. We had in the space of a few months:
object in foot
cut head
bad cough needing steroid thing (sent there by GP)
suspected meningitis
possible broken toe (wasn’t)
possible broken wrist (was)

Our children’s A&E is also separate like yours. The only time I have been there and been offered a room to wait was when DS was four weeks old and ended up being admitted to the wards, he was really unwell.

surely if you are such a frequent flyer then you can appreciate that there is very limited capacity, long wait times and the sickest patients taking priority.

i probably would have scoffed too in an “are you joking” kind of way

I doubt she was laughing at you, more at the state of things in the NHS. A bit like how I get the urge to laugh when people think it'll be about a 1 week wait for their order and we haven't had a delivery turn up for nearly a month without being chased daily.

Bloody rude, what's wrong with saying ' I'm sorry not at the moment but if one becomes free I'll let you know' As a retired Nurse with 40 years service it is never acceptable to behave like this. You were both ill and she made you feel worse, what the hell has happened to compassion and kindness. I used to tell my staff to smile and nod, even if you were seething on the inside, just smile and try to be nice. I'm not advocating this for abusive patients, but for sick people waiting then a kind word costs nothing.Health professionals are charged with doing no harm, but she did, she made you feel worse.

Sorry you were feeling unwell OP but you asked for a room because of your needs not your childs. It's a children's A&E, I imagine they keep precious resources like that for children who need them, especially at busy times.I wonder if being given a room 9 times out of 10 has given you a sense of entitlement.

I don't know why you are still thinking about it. I hope you're not thinking about making a complaint. Your child was seen and presumably is feeling better because they received the appropriate care. The A&E staff did their job which doesn't include providing beds for people who aren't patients.

Of course I understand that.

But she didn't need to scoff. Usually they either offer it or if we ask if one is free, they say yes - or no sorry not now, maybe later we will come to get you.

It's unusual that she did that.

It’s unusual you are still thinking about it imo

No, but op was and I for one believe she is in the best position to state what happened right in front of her face.

To be fair, the nurse was in a better position to know whether she laughed/scoffed.

And she said she didn't do either.

I suppose if your child had been triaged and didn’t need to be admitted to a ward then they weren’t priority for a room- I don’t think they’d take you feeling sick into account when it’s children’s A and E and the children are the priority. She shouldn’t have scoffed but she was probably knackered

You sound ridiculously indignant that someone might have laughed at something you said.

Yes, she should have been professional, polite, kind and patient.

But she was a nurse in A&E at 3am with a six hour wait and a non-urgent case asking for their own room. Just attempt a tiny bit of empathy and let it go. You might even have been short with one of your own customers, colleagues or clients at some point.

People saying the OP sounds entitled - as I said upthread my autistic daughter often uses the "quiet" room in the various A+Es we've been in.
We usually say "is the quiet room available please" or words to that effect.
Once it wasn't but they let us take 2 chairs out to sit in the corridor where it was quieter. Normally if you leave the area they don't go looking for you when your name is called - but it was noted that we were in the corridor so they came to fetch us.

I think op knows what she heard, she really has no reason to lie, a nurse who knows she shouldn't have scoffed has plenty of reason to deny it.

@TeapotTitties yes I just completely made it up for shits and giggles. Of course she laughed! Then she denied it when I held her to account.

I wasn't mean about how I held her to account, but I did.

She was surprised because she never expected that from me, because I'm usually extremely polite with her. She's can be a bit of a grump and I always remain super super polite with her and never challenge her. There have been other times her bed side manner wasn't the best. Nothing extreme, but another person may have reacted in a similar curt manner. I never do that with her.

She was taken a back that I stood up to her and of course she immediately denied it.

But no I am definitely not making a complaint about it.

My God, so many people on this thread have a really low bar.

The nurse was inappropriate and rude. That is unprofessional.

Why have people come to accept unprofessional behaviour from medical professionals? And worse still, gaslight and have a go at those of us who dare to call it out? Some of you need to give your heads a wobble.

OP I hope both you and your child are feeling better. Our Children's A&E also have those little rooms that you're talking about. The last time we were there, they actually apologised for having us wait in the waiting room for so long before getting us into a room. That's professional, caring behaviour.

I hope the nurse thinks twice about her behaviour after you raised it with her.

Genuinely just can't imagine having such a sense of entitlement in any environment or situation in life, let alone in an a&e department. That poor nurse. Any chance she was laughing to herself think oh blimey it's her again... "9 out of 10 times", that's a heck of a high frequency of accidents/emergencies in your family 🤦🏼 no wonder the NHS is in the state it's in hey