Friday Randoms

Today I pulled up to my school and parked behind a car with a license plate holder: "My other ride is my wife." Only in this neighborhood would I consider this perfectly normal.

Everything happens to me. The number of times I tell another nurse what happened at my school that I hear a "Wow, I've never seen that before" is becoming ridiculous - and this is coming from nurses that have been in the district for a decade or longer. This week never-seen-befores included an injury necessitating a wheelchair (my second!), the bleeding eye poke, and HFMD - see below.

HFMD: Hand Foot and Mouth Disease. One of my students was out sick with it, prompting me to become an expert so I could sound semi-competent when I talk with the secretaries about it. The discussion turned into an excellent dialogue, and since it was via email, there were no ears to overhear me saying it how it is: wash your hands, don't swim in poop, and you'll be fine. Usually.

This brings me to my next point. I'm all for the good germ theory, that it takes some to build up resistance, but I am also pro-hand hygiene. And, since becoming a nurse, I've decided hand hygeine is incredibly underrated. My offices are all connected to a bathroom that staff can use. One in particular has a noisy sink and paper towel dispenser, so I always know when people have washed their hands. The number of people - adults - that leave without washing their hands is nothing short of utterly disgusting. Another office of mine has a toilet only, so to wash hands users need to come back into my main office. Further, I face the bathroom door and sink there: I know who comes and goes and it's right in front of my face when someone stops to wash their hands. Interestingly, not a single person leaves without washing. Would more people in the first office wash their hands if I turned my desk around and they had to face me as they left? I don't want to know.