Neither medicine nor nursing is practiced at the bedside anymore. Charting has consumed our professions. Charting is the act of writing and documenting patient care details. Do you want to know where your doctor or nurse is? More than likely, they have their heads buried in a computer somewhere far away from your every need.
You're having pain, you say? Your call light is going unaswered, you say? Don't worry, your nurse is probably at the computer down the hall charting your Wong-Baker Faces Pain Rating Scale. If you've ever been admitted to a hospital, I'm sure you've seen these cartoon-like facial images depicting pain and a number associated with that level of pain. The scale offers a number from 0-10 with zero indicating no pain and ten meaning "hurts worst". For the general public, please note the scale ends at ten. If you say you have 12/10 pain, your electronic charting will spit out a value of not acceptable (N/A). Nurses have been instructed to treat N/A as 0/10 pain.
I'm sorry Mrs Wong and or whomever you are. Your pain scale is irrelevant into today's excessive charting environment. Nurses just don't have time to care about answering their patient's call light in a reasonable amount of time. They don't have time to provide bedside pain scale evaluations that your organization is so proud of. They are too busy trying to figure out the newest change of the week in their EHR.
So, what's important for nurses to know and to document these days? I present to you Happy's Pain In My Ass Scale. Nurses don't care if their patients are having pain. During nursing checkout, they want to know from their colleagues if their patient is going to be a pain in the ass today. So I've created a proprietary new pain scale for use by nurses, for nurses to help them summarize how their day is going to be.
How does the Pain In My Ass Scale work? In the interest of robotic Joint Commission standards, I offer only two possible scenarios. Nurses should chart a 0 if the patient is not a pain in the ass. Nurses should chart a 10 if the patient is a pain in the ass. By charting this vitally important 5th vital sign, nurses can emotionally prepare for their tough day in the trenches. Go forth great nurses. Help your fellow nurses prepare for their day by always charting your Pain In My Ass Scale, as this original Happy someecard helps explain.
