Nurses – Thick as Thieves?!

My stethoscope has been stolen.

I looked everywhere, in drawers, behind monitors, on top of cabinets, in our break room, even went to PACU to see if it “floated” over there. I quizzed everyone in a Mafia-like way about my ever so loved work toy.

No luck. It’s really gone.

Someone needed or wanted it badly, my dark green $59 Littman stethoscope, the gift I gave myself when I got my last pay raise. And yes, I’d been told more than once that I should try to remember to lock it in my locker, but here’s the kicker. Our unit is locked at 7 pm.

There is a chest pain clinic attached to us, and the entrance to it, its badge coded. So, you have to be a nurse, or security, in order to get in. The thief is most likely a nurse.

I had an allergy band with my name on it wrapped around the Y connection of the scope. I printed very neatly. I always placed it on the counter in front of our nurses’ station. I expected that it would be used by others during the day. But this, this makes me so #%$@* angry!

Whoever you are, you better be using it and using it right! Listen under the gown, not over it; posterior and anterior, don’t forget bowel sounds, fistula graft checks. You’ve got a pediatric patient – turn it around.

I am going to stay in my bubble and think that you needed this stethoscope really badly, that’s why you took it, not because you wanted it as a trinket, it matched your scrubs, or something silly like that. My attachment to it was because I like my work and want to be thorough, not because I have some juvenile notion that a stethoscope around my neck makes me look cool. They’re bulky and my pockets are big enough to carry it comfortably. It wasn’t an image thing.

I’m going to buy a new stethoscope. This one will have my name engraved on it.

And I’m going to sit it on the desk counter at the end of every day.

Go ahead.

I dare you.

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