Tuesday's Blog- The Shift

The Shift - Theresa Brown, RN

"An ordinary day shot through with the crystalline illumination of earned success, a gem-like moment." (Brown, 60)

    Theresa Brown is an ordinary woman living an ordinary life with her husband and two children. However her life is completely different when she walks into work. Written in first person, she lets us experience and learn what happens in the twelve short hours of a busy hospital oncology department. In those twelve hours, we do not know what to expect. Lives can be lost or lives can be saved. As an RN (registered nurse), Brown will need to document every little thing about a patient whether it be medical histories to different symptoms the patient is having, helping preform diagnostic tests, providing treatment, administrating medications, and monitoring patients progress.

    Through the twelve hours she has four patients. Sheila, Candace, Richard Hampton, and Dorothy. Sheila has a hole in her gut that is leaking bowel contents into her abdomen tearing her intestine due to a blood clot- also called a "perf". Candace is a returning cancer patient who is a huge pain to the RN's, Richard Hampton is a patient with lymphoma who Brown is in charge of making the decision to administer a risky drug called Rituxan that may do more harm than good, and Dorothy who spent six weeks in the hospital due to Leukemia, is finally going home. When Brown found out Dorothy's ANC (absolute neutrophil count) was a 850 and an ANC reliably above a 500 indicates enough of an immune system to go home, Brown described this as "An ordinary day shot through with the crystalline illumination of earned success, a gem- like moment" (Brown, 60). That month and a half was described as accomplished. As an RN the main role is to provide emotional and physical support to patients and their family members during difficult times and to do their best with helping treat a patient and make them better than before. When a cancer patient is able to go home after a long stay in the hospital it may mean the world to not only the patient or their family but to the nurse as well. The feeling of helping someone that is in pain or really needs assistance, hope, and support is a "crystalline illumination of earned success, a gem-like moment".

    It is the best feeling to help others and make them happy again. This connects to myself because I want to be a nurse one day and if as a teenager today loves the feeling of helping my grandma grocery shop because she can't on her own, I can only image how I would feel if I helped someone that was struggling to live, or help someone in immense pain feel better or feel like a new person. Brown also stated, " I wish I had more time to sit and hold every patient's hand. To really listen" (Brown, 122). A nurse's job is not only to just help and assist but to bond with the patient and become someone they can trust and feel protected by. I feel like I have a connection with the author because we both have the love for wanting to listen to what others are feeling and help make what they are feeling stronger and better.

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Brown, Theresa. The Shift: One Nurse, Twelve Hours, Four Patients' Live N.p.: n.p., n.d.Print