Failure… a four letter word?

In Nyel’s Hospital Room

The hand-over was happening: day-nurse-to-night-nurse.  Lots of information being communicated but the words “chronic kidney disease” are what grabbed our attention.  “I have chronic kidney disease?” Nyel asked.  “Well… yes.  Your creatin levels have been off for some time.”

It’s amazing what the use of a word or two can do. We knew about the creatin.  We’ve participated in the efforts to correct that problem.  What we didn’t know was the ‘chronic disease’ part.  How did we miss that?

Nyel and His Heart Healthy Lunch

Even worse were the words on the educational literature handed to Nyel by another nurse:  Caring for Your Heart:  Living Well with Heart Failure.  FAILURE?? That was another term no doctor had used before.  Yet, his cardiologists and surgeons and primary caregivers had provided Nyel with all the same instructions and advice that the booklet held.  It was just the word “failure” they hadn’t used.  It’s a word that grabs your attention – maybe just as much as some of the other F words we avoid at all costs.

Would we have been more cautious, paid more attention, called 911 a day or two earlier had those words been used?  Probably.   Do the doctors purposely avoid using words like ‘chronic’ and ‘failure’ or do we purposely avoid hearing them?  Are we being obtuse or in denial or what?

Medical Dictionaries

These are some of the discussions we have while we wait for levels to go up or down, for yet another EKG, for the results of the latest lab tests, for the doctors to say “go home.”  Words.  We bandy them about so carelessly sometimes and carefully closet them away at others.  We weigh the meanings of “tolerate” and “acceptable” and “acute” and we try to listen and remember.

Words have power – we know that.  Some even have the power to make us feel powerless. When all the words are said and done, we just do the best we can.

2 Responses to “Failure… a four letter word?”

  1. Stephanie Frieze says:

    I believe that doctors have a duty to be completely honest with patients, for heaven’s sake! Well, several years ago a nurse at Ocean Beach told me that my mother had congestive heart failure, something the doctor had never said and never did. If she does, she seems to be doing okay. That had to be at least eight years ago and here she is 94. Doing the best we can is all any of us can do.

  2. sydney says:

    All of our doctors have been marvelous about explaining and informing — right down to drawing diagrams on the white board in Nyel’s room. It’s just the terminology that might differ — especially with regard to those red-flag words like “failure” and “chronic.” Or perhaps we missed them.

Leave a Reply