Psychiatric Experience Essay

Last week, I had a chance to experience the psychiatric emergency service. There were many things that surprised me when I was down there. First of all, I didn’t realize how small the psychiatric emergency room was. The waiting area seated maybe 10 people, most of the rooms were triage rooms that only had chairs in them, and there were only about five seclusion rooms that contained beds. Supposedly, patients can end up waiting in PES for days before there is room on the units to be admitted. The small size of the emergency room, plus the lack of beds really surprise me because I felt that it was not adequate enough for the traffic that comes through PES. Another thing I felt was inadequate was the fact that to work as a nurse in PES, you weren’t …show more content…
He was a schizophrenic, who had been noncompliant in receiving his antipsychotic injection. He also hadn’t slept in at least 2 days, and was psychotic. His father called for an ambulance to bring him to PES in order to get admitted to 9C. When he arrived, he was completely strapped down to the gurney, accompanied by two paramedics and two security guards since he had been combative on the way over. After they got the patient settled into a seclusion room, a psychiatrist came out to talk to him. At this point, the patient was relatively calm, and was willing to talk to the doctor. However, he was psychotic and rambling on and on about how he was trying to help people, and how nobody believed him. He also stated a few times that we were all acting under a lie, and were not there to help me, but instead, prevent him from doing his job of helping others. The staff that was tending to him included the psychiatrist, a nurse, a medical assistant, and three security guards. When he heard that the physician intended to admit him, because of his distorted logic, he was extremely paranoid, and was very adamant about not allowing anyone to take his vital signs. He also refused a blood test and antipsychotic medication. It took a lot of convincing from the psychiatrist, the medical assistant, the nurse, and the security guard for the patient to allow one of the security guards to take his vitals, and even more convincing to allow the nurse …show more content…
For example, I learned about the shortcomings of a psychiatric service that I can aim to help improve in the future, in addition, it taught me the importance of being patient, if the first girl hadn’t gamed without me, I could have known that it was hot dogs! Professional development definitely need to educate PES nurses more in depth or require them to have more psych in their background in order to provide the best care possible to the patients. This experience has really shown me the importance of avoiding sigma around the mental illnesses that have potential to present at PES, as well as establishing rapport with patients right from the get-go. Even a difficult patient like this could be more compliant if he has trust in the healthcare provider. As a nurse, we are the one coming in contact with the patient the most, so it’s important to not let stigma get in the way of helping the patient recover to the best of our ability, remember to help guide them during their stay, and most important of all, advocate for your patient – no matter what their diagnosis