Dealing with a delicate death situation, providing help for a colleague, keeping dignity and care appropriate, using levity and humor to provide stress relief.
Pic: Public Domain
In the past when I worked as a Medical Social Worker at a local hospital, one of our patients had unfortunately died and was taken to the hospital's morgue, as usual, before a designated and authorized funeral home would come to pick up the body.
My role was to provide supportive counseling to the deceased patient's family and assist as needed; by their request, I joined them in praying for their loved one and helping them share their understandable grief.
Per the hospital protocol back then, after all the appropriate documentation was completed, an identifier Patient ID was to be placed on the cadaver's Right Great Toe by one of our CNAs, whom had accompanied the body with hospital security to the morgue.
Well somehow, the CNA realized that after she had gotten distracted in the morgue, she had put the Patient ID on the wrong foot of a different cadaver, as she had forgotten to verify the identity of the body per fully lifting the cover to see the face of the deceased.
When she couldn't get herself to go back down to the morgue, she asked, and I volunteered to take care of the delicate matter; I have to admit that it was with much trepidation that I was able to appropriately do this, being that it was the first time that I had gone to the hospital morgue.
After all that was needed to be done was handled with dignity and care, a little levity helped to lighten the load on me and the CNA, as our co-workers dubbed us the "bare-footing undertakers!"
Footloose and fancy free. So glad you were able ease her mind after that terrible mistake. And so glad you had the courage to go down and correct it. A morgue must be one eerie place to visit.
i can understand your trepidation. especially in an arena of possibly many corpses. i remember once, 50 years ago when the only distinguishing feature between two corpses (not in a sterile environment), where the two men were of different ethnic heritage was one was married and had worn a wedding ring. that was all we had to identify anything on. we unfortunately not "Foot Loose".
A page-turning novel about a relationship between best friends that is interrupted because of betrayal , deceit, sexual promiscuity and pregnancy happens!
A page-turning novel about a relationship between best friends that is interrupted because of betrayal , deceit, sexual promiscuity and pregnancy happens!
Pic: Public Domain
