My child was a patient for five days on the pediatric floor; we originally came into the hospital through the pediatric emergency room with abdominal pain, and were subsequently admitted. Upon initial examination and x-rays, my 6-year-old son was thought to have constipation and excessive amount of stool that needed to pass. He received enemas, an NG tube and an IV to attempt to assist him in "going". Our son had been "going" all along, even prior to his admission to the hospital. As parents, when you have a child that has extreme pain, you want to find relief. So we were prepared to find whatever remedy that was needed to relieve him. But after he'd received the treatments and was still not seeing relief and was still experiencing extreme pain, we were concerned. The GI specialist was preparing for us to be released, our primary doctor was reviewing the information and we were in the middle.
One of our nurses, Destiny, stood out above the rest. When we had questions or concerns, she was knowledgeable about our journey while we'd been there. She was empathetic to our concerns and she was the perfect advocate for us as parents. She took the time to walk us through each step of the process, speak to the doctors about the medical terminology that we were not familiar with, and ensured we were prepared to speak to them as well. We looked forward to her time coming in each day, because we knew that we would be cared for thoroughly and we were disappointed when we found it was time for her "off days".
Destiny is a perfect example of what a nurse should be.