Everyone is doing whatever they can to prevent this from occurring. The government is regulating the hours personnel can work on hospital floors. Machines are being built ever more sophisticated to handle IV drips. And evidently my school is using shock value to train us to be as alert as possible. "Everyone makes mistakes" my professors cheerfully announce before reading a newspaper article in which a patient received epinephrine instead of antibiotics and her heart sped up so fast it killed her. My classmates and I sit, wide-eyed and paralyzed with fear.
Okay, they've got me terrified. And with very good reason. No one wants to make that kind of error.
I'm already arguably somewhat borderline OCD. I am consistently worried about burning my house down. I straighten my hair. I turn off the straightening iron. I unplug it. I finish whatever else I need to do before I go. I gather my belongings. I check once more to make sure the hair straightener is unplugged. I leave.
Occasionally I don't do all of these steps. I will unplug the hair straightener, get my stuff, and go. I will be on my way somewhere, likely in the act of stepping onto my train when a little voice in my brain will say, "Hang on a second, is the straightening iron unplugged?"
"Of course it is," I think to myself. "I have a tremendous fear of burning my house down, stemming from the fact that my cousin did burn her house down. So I'm sure I turned it off and unplugged it."
"Are you really sure?"
.....
"Did you check?"
"Well, I-"
"I think you should go back once more and check again."
And I have to. Because if I argue and think to myself "I'm sure it's off. I'm sure I would have turned it off. I always turn it off and unplug it," my brain will shoot back with, "Wouldn't you rather walk a few blocks and look one more time than be sorry you didn't later?"
And so I'll head back home, unless I can come up with a memory that sufficiently proves to myself that the hair straightener is off. Often times I can. I will recall that the straightening iron almost fell off the counter or that the button to turn it off was particularly sticky that morning. But if nothing remarkable happened, that is, if everything went according to plan, I can't be completely certain that I didn't forget. Because, apparently, I'M INSANE.
But I really feel better after I have made sure the straightening iron is off. Yes, I'm sometimes irritated at myself. Not for being crazy and obsessive and potentially making myself late, but for not being thorough enough the first time. "Why didn't you just check to make sure before you left the apartment? You were right there." I'll ask myself. But aside from some harmless self-berating, I am generally happy and believe I may have possibly prevented a fire.
Apparently this is a welcome quality in nursing. Checking and re-checking and checking once more and asking someone if you are in doubt are standard procedures. I'm in heaven.
