The comfort garden
Subtitle: tales from the trauma unit
By: Laurie Barkin
Edition: 1st ed.
Publisher: Fresh Pond Press
Published: 2011
Place of publication: San Francisco
Language: eng
Number of pages: 364
ISBN-13: 9780984496549
Subjects: Psychic trauma; Psychiatric Nursing; Psychology; Nurse-Patient Relations; Crisis intervention (Mental health services); Trauma Centers; Methods; Post-traumatic stress disorder; Treatment; Professional Burnout; Psychiatric nursing; Psychotherapy; Traumatology; Crisis Intervention
Other titles: Tales from the trauma unit
Description: The Comfort Garden is Laurie Barkin's account of the five years she worked as a psychiatric nurse on the surgical/trauma unit at San Francisco General Hospital. Told against the backdrop of patients who survived motor vehicle accidents, falls, fires, fists, bullets, and knives, The Comfort Garden is a metaphor for the emotional support caregivers need. The story illuminates the issues of compassion fatigue and vicarious trauma that may develop in caregivers when exposure to tragedy becomes routine.

The Comfort Garden will appeal to health care professionals, firefighters, police, war veterans, social workers, journalists, students, and anyone whose life is touched by trauma.
Table of contents: title: Listening to trauma; title: "As real as it gets"; title: Beginnings; title: "It ain't right"; title: "For an easy fix, get yourself admitted to General Hospital"; title: Maiden voyage; title: "How can you bear to listen?"; title: Balancing the big scale in the sky; title: A walking time bomb; title: Sweet interlude; title: Support needed; title: The bully; title: Boundary violations; title: Absorbing trauma; title: Mismanaged care; title: Limit-setting will not be tolerated in San Francisco; title: Survivor guilt; title: Holding up the weight of the world; title: It has a name!; title: The vacation; title: The confrontation; title: Nightmares; title: "Who will take care of the caregivers?"; title: "If I am not a nurse, who am I?"; title: The last stroll.