Poor Nursing Care from Palliative Care Team Langley BC
Palliative Care experience in Langley BC
A brief history of my mother. Over eighteen months ago my mother was hospitalized at Langley Memorial Hospital. At that time she was seen by the Palliative Care Team who suggested that she be admitted to the Palliative Care Unit. Upon consultation with the staff at Cornerstone Resources our family decided to provide her with full time nursing care aides (24/7) and have her return to the her retirement home in Langley. My mother’s expressed wishes were and is to die at home. She suffers from dementia and has lung cancer.
On June 11, 2018 my sisters and I contacted the Palliative Care nurse in Langley by phone. At that time my mother, who is terminally ill and is currently in the final stage of dying was having breakthrough pain. We contacted her nurse to ask for help with pain management.
The nurse, who I will refer to as Nurse A, told us that she would contact the Doctor. I personally went over to the Dr's clinic where I discovered that he was away until 8am the following morning and that there was not a physician available to deal with my mother. We phoned back to the palliative care nurse to ask for guidance. She told us that she would check into it and call us back in five minutes. She called back 45 minutes later and told us there was nothing she could do. She went on to tell us that Mom was not a Palliative Care patient which shocked us as Palliative care nurses have been visiting her regularly over the past eighteen months. She went on to ask if we had their after hours phone number and told us repeatedly that she was trying to “problem solve” and repeated to us several times what our concerns were saying “I’m trying to problem solve.”
At the same time she was talking to someone in the background named (another nurse) who seemed to be trying to help her help us. She then told us she would call us back. Which she did with the advice that Palliative care could do nothing and that what we should do is call an ambulance and have the paramedics take Mom to the emergency department at Langley Memorial Hospital where she could be seen by a physician there and said that at emergency and that we should ask for a “care plan” be made up for our mother. She said then we would have the ambulance service bring Mom back to her apartment. My mother experiences extreme pain with repositioning in bed.
Our understanding from past visits by the Palliative care nurses was that they would be able to assist us with our Mother’s eventual death and ensure that she would be kept comfortable. On that day, with our mother in pain, this was not the case. Which is what I said to “Nurse A”. I also told her that she was not good at her job.
As this conversation was happening, a supervisor, from Sources Cornerstone came to check on my Mom. She was sitting next to me during my conversation with “Nurse A”. Before I hung up she asked if she could talk to Nurse A and see if there was something that could be done to help my Mom besides calling an ambulance. She spoke to Nurse for several minutes with “Nurse A” saying she was trying to ‘problem solve” and would make some inquiries. She did and called back telling us there was nothing she could do. Her parting words to us were “I hope everything works out.”
Yesterday I had a phone call from “Nurse B”. She did not identify what her position was with the Palliative Care team. She accused me of putting “Nurse A” in an unsafe work environment, citing that my comment to "Nurse A" that she wasn't good at her job made her feel unsafe and referred to “Workplace BC Act” several times . Several times she said she would not allow her staff to be in an “unsafe” situation and threatened to withdraw services for my mother from Palliative Care.
I tried my best to explain to her the situation and the phone calls that had occurred the previous day. Her tone was aggressive and accusatory. I suggested that she speak to the care supervisor who witnessed the exchange and she again aggressively refused saying that she would only speak to family. I informed her that the supervisor had my permission to speak to her on my Mother’s behalf and still does.
I experienced the conversation to be threatening and emotionally upsetting. I told her I no longer wished to continue with it and terminated the call. My sister, then called nurse B back immediately. We were panicked that what little support we had in the community for our mother was now going to be taken away from her. Nurse B told my sister that a Palliative care nurse would be in to visit my Mom but that I was not to be there when the nurse came. This treatment is uncalled for, it is emotionally traumatizing at this time and is unwarranted.
I am shocked beyond words to be told that my mother by “Nurse A” that my mother was not a Palliative Care client.
I was also shocked by “Nurse A's” lack of knowledge. She did acknowledge that she was new to the area and that this was a new office for her.
With thanks to the Mom’s Pharmacist we were able to devise a “cocktail” which got Mom through the night and the following day her Dr adjusted her pain medication.
I, as a retired R.N. who has worked many years in critical care and at the college level as well as having served on the board of the RNABC, am shocked by the treatment that I received yesterday. I have never spoken to a family member in the manner and tone that I was spoken to yesterday. It was unwarranted and inflammatory.
