Cooperating for better care.

Alexandra Robbins

Tag Archives

Nurses detail special treatment for the rich

 

In a Politico article to promote her new book, Alexandra Robbins details some of the healthcare industry’s  glaring class-divisions after she interviewed many nurses. The book vividly demonstrates the ever-widening gap between the very rich and everyone else in the treatment they get almost everywhere.

The book is called The Nurses: A Year of Secrets, Drama, and Miracles with the Heroes of the Hospital.

Nurses  told Ms. Robbins about the luxury treatment that rich celebrities  receive in hospitals, often unknown to rank-and-file patients at the same hospitals.

Rich and/or influential patients often get bigger rooms, big-screen TVs, luxurious furniture, better food and even separate floors.

It gets worse:  Nurses also indicated that resources for VIP’s can hurt other patients’ care.  Consider that one nurse said it her hospital  moved critically ill patients away from the nursing station to make way for VIP patients who needed required less observation and care.

 


‘Patient-experience’ focus can be so Mickey Mouse

An article in The Atlantic argues that “a misguided attempt to improve healthcare has led some hospitals to focus on making people happy, rather than making them well.”

The author, Alexandra Robbins, writes:

“When hospitals improve nurse working conditions, rather than tricking patients into believing they’re getting better care, the quality of care really does get better.”

“Instead, hospitals are responding to the current {patient-satisfaction} surveys and weighting system by focusing on smiles over substance, hiring actors instead of nurses, and catering to patients’ wishes rather than their needs. Then again, perhaps it’s no wonder that companies are airbrushing healthcare with a ‘Disney-like experience,’ a glossy veneer. One of the leading consulting companies now advising hospitals on ‘building a culture of healthcare excellence’ is, oddly enough, the Walt Disney Company.


Contact Info

info@cmg625.com

(617) 230-4965

Wellesley, MA