Did I do somethg wrong?

amother

Seafoam

Thu, Jun 18 2015, 2:52 pm

I am currently on a placement in a hospital as part of my training. The other day the lady who
Is the leader of my programme turned up and said she wanted to speak to me to see how things are going so I got up from my seat to go with her. As I was walking with her out of the room, a lady walked in who was a relative of a patient. This lady walks straight up to me (she did not know me at all) and asked me if I could help her. She was a bit flustered and said she wanted to know where the meeting is taking place between her family member ( the patient) and the physio as she was meant to be attending herself. I said of course I will help her and try and find out for her. I asked what is the name of the patient, she told me and so I went to go to his bed to try and find out for her. The curtains were closed so I very slightly opened them (I am in my uniform), and peeped in to ask a member of staff if there is currently a physio meeting taking place. This woman was very annoyed me and told me she is busy and cannot speak to me now. All this time the lady who is head of my programme was watching this situation and looking at me with a very disapproving look as if I was handling the situation terribly. I came back and said to the visitor I am very sorry but unfortunately the patient is busy at the moment so I couldn't find any information right now. She got very flustered and started saying "I came all this way...etc etc". As she was walking away, the lady from my university said to me very angrily, "well, are you not even going to find anyone to help her??" I was very embarrassed since I genuinely did try to help this lady, I said to her I will try to find someone (but by that stage the visitor had walked off in a huff and there was no member if staff around for me to ask).
Did I really behave badly? I really did want to help Sad

do you think I am in trouble?

mummiedearest

Thu, Jun 18 2015, 3:01 pm

why not ask the program leader?

I imagine you could have paged someone over the loudspeaker. if you were the only staff member available, you probably should have asked the program leader if you could schedule the chat for a less busy moment. giving the woman the name of someone more likely to be able to help her would have been useful as well.

I really don't know about what your program leader expects from you. as the relative of patients, I feel communication is often lacking when it comes to dealing with family. sometimes something as simple as, "I know you need me to do this, I'll be with you in a minute" is appropriate. family members are often confused when dealing with hospital staff, and the staff assumes they are not.