Life is too short to be this stressed

Wow. As a recent GN I'm not looking forward to the grunt work. You should get a least one year of experience and move up the ladder as you get your BSN and MS degree.

the grunt work- there is no shame in doing bedside nursing- this is the essence of nursing- where nursing begins, it's reality - not nursing administration. a bedside nurse with razor sharp assessment skills often times mean life and death for a patient. It's the bedside nurse who informs the nursing administrator that there is a problem. a nursing administrator has to have bedside experience to even understand what the reported problem is. sadly enough alot of time they don't- have enough bedside experience. bedside nursing is great we need the staff to do it, which means we need the new grads, who need competent orientation/preceptors to help get them there. you new grads are the reinforcements. we need to get the controllers of the purse strings to take off their greedy blinders to see this. and put some money into the workforce. that staffing ratios of 1:6,7,8 on med/surg and tele floors are deadly- then all the money the budget and finance offices horde have to be given out in out of court lawsuit settlements. how disqusting- sorry for your loved ones loss here's some money- like a department store- the dress didn't fit, here's your money back. the entire nursing and hospital culture needs to change. it begins at the grunt work level- the bedside-- the first to go should be this garbage of customer service/ satisfaction. I have never seen anyone write on discharge instructions-Cashier/checkout- Did You Find Everything Alright? your total comes to $300,000 would you like cashback.

Well...I really am glad to read these posts b/c I have been conisdering nursing for 5 years now and have not made the decision to go back to school yet. I love medicine, I have a CNA license, I want to help people when they are sick but when I read these posts I do have second thoughts. Maybe I have a "dream" of nursing that is not the reality in any way. My husband once spent 3 hours in the ER at a very good hospital and never saw a doctor/nurse and we ended up at another ER where he ended up having an appendectomy. That's when I started to think more about going into nursing b/c i wanted to try and prevent things like that from happening but I may be disillusioned. I have a job working from home...which is great....but I have wanted to go into nursing for years now. But gosh...everyone I talk to here at home who is in nursing and then reading these forums makes me see that it isn;t exactly what I think it is. I am starting to understand where the "shortage" is stemming from...kind of like in "teaching" where there is so much turnover.

I don't mean to discourage anyone from entering nursing if that is what they really want. I think all should go into nursing with a realistic picture of what exactly nursing envolves- what does a CNA?, what is the role of the LPN? What is the RN's role. Nursing is not glamorous- it's hard work on all 3 levels- each level has their own SPECIFIC PRIMARY functions that they are directly responsible for( the CNA and the LPN answer directly to the RN they are assigned with-yes, the LPN and the RN can do the CNA work but the LPN and the RN have work/tasks they are "assigned" by their license that the CNA cannot do, The RN has work/tasks that can ONLY be carried out by an RN per their license(all levels of licenses comes from the Board of Nursing- which puts into place laws that govern nursing practice) I have come across on these busy floors where LPN's and CNA's often resent the RN- ie. a call bell goes off the RN could be at the meds or the computer/chart documentating and the RN is expected to stop and answer the light. the comment is why can't the RN get that (light) the RN is closer: that's not the point- the point is the Board of Nursing and or/ the hospital policy dictates the RN only is to give out certain meds and/ or to do specific documentation( assessments- very lengthy, admission data, doctors orders etc) to disrupt a nurse during giving out meds is VERY dangerous- the are 2 people involved- the Patient recepient of the med and the Nurse giving the med- THIS IS ALL THE TIME. I have on occassion told a CNA or LPN "here, you go give this IV lopressor and I will answer the light" I once stuck up for a new RN coworker who was being "prevented from doing his job by a group of CNA's- ALL the CNA's were in the lunch room together having lunch, only the RN's were out on the floor (we had no LPN's) a call bell went off for a bedpan- the RN assigned had just got an admission from the ER and needed blood transfusing( an active GI bleed) the RN asked me to ask the CNA to get the light while he went to the Lab to pick up the blood- what I got for a response was- Oh does he think he's too good to put some one on the bedpan. What's wrong with this picture. this happens ALL the TIME- this makes nursing an uphill fight, and more stressful than it already is. this is not glamorous. That same RN had a patient go into cardiogenic shock NOONE would help him- how dangerous is that. I reported this to the Manager- (the BSN) AND the Chief Nursing Officer (the MSN)- NOTHING was done- I was patted on the head- thankyou for your teamwork. I was fired because I spoke up about the bedpan insident- I dearly loved that job- tele in an urban unserved area of a big city. I was furious and went to the hospital CEO, the hospital lawyer and the state's department of labor- the CEO had the hospital lawyer go up to the floor to interview and investigate, the hospital lawyer had to give a written response to the State Dept of Labor- the statement was "there's no problem found on this nursing floor, all the nurses were happy and work together well. This is the reality, the unglamorous/ugly side of nursing. there are so many facets to this- the waste of money employing a lawyer to dictate NURSING responsibilty( stick his no nursing knowlege nose into nursing affairs, an office degree nurse manager who didn't know what to do , a MSN office nurse who didn't know what to do) and patient's lives being threatened by insubordination, and RN nursing licenses in jeopardy of prosecution for neglect. This is the reality of Nursing

Please read the thread- Nursing Board investigates Reno Hospital NURSE Managers. here's another example of bedside/ER RN's making ligitimate complains that need addressing and those complaints being covered up by the money people of hospital administration. this just shows nothing is going to be fixed in nursing, it will be covered up and aspergians will be cast on those who dare to to have the good conscious/prudence( it's in the nurse practice act) to come foreward and expose/complain. this is office/administrative nursing at it's best- collecting big salaries, no clue as to what bedside nurses do and calling upon stupid( non nursing educated) administors/lawyers to help them out with PR press statements- FIX THE PROBLEM AND MOVE ON TO THE REAL ESSESENCE OF NURSING_ PATIENT CARE AND SAFTEY. STOP WASTING MONEY THAT COULD BE SPENT ON OPENING NEW GRAD POSITIONS WITH COMPETENT ORIENTATION so they can be competent, functioning members of the bedsie nursing workforce.

One more thing that I'd like to supply: pharmacy's carzy phone calls over and over again.

I agree. I have worked other jobs, even minimum wage jobs that let me have a break away from the job site and even eat. I am leaving my med/onc floor after 9 months. 14 hour days, some nights I pee twice, some not at all. My floor used to be ortho, but the onc pts are MUCH sicker. The families don't want to make them DNR so I have had multiple codes in a night. Staffing hasn't changed even though acuity has. I feel bad for my pts. But I don't enjoy my job, can't have a life.

My last day is this Thursday.

Hmm... from my experience, the "laid back and happy ones", who never miss a meal (like breakfast in the middle of their med pass time!) and always leave on time are excellent at avoiding their pts and/or their families (one used to hide out in the med room with his med cart), take unbelievable shorts cuts and/or just don't do all the things that should be done during their shift (e.g., change IV lines). Does that make them better nurses? You decide.

DeLana

P.S. No offense intended to those of you who really do manage to handle incredible, unsafe pt loads (like the 1:8 ratio on a high acuity, high pt turnover med/tele/PCU where I used to work and where 12-hour shifts turned into 14- and 15-hour shifts) while providing good nursing care to all their pts. Hats off to you, you're truly supernurses (no sarcasm, just admiration!)

Work as a CNA before you invest money into nursing school. You will get an up front and close view of nursing and hospitals.

You are not going to prevent things like what happen to your husband from happening....hospitals suck, and most nursing jobs are awful. Go to PA school or something else. I wouldn't recommend nursing to anyone. I'm lucky in that I have a great job but great nursing jobs are few and far between, I just got lucky.

I'm responding to the poster who wrote about the nurse dodging patients and families in the med room and not doing the maintaince work of their shift- changing IV tubing- DITTO- I'm tired of coming in and following these nurses- you go to give an IV antibiotic and you now have to leave the room ONE more time and get the tubing that should have been done before you. I'm old, I'm tired and I'm fed-up. I'm fed up with this downsizing, laying off, cancelling MY shifts, no money, Im tired of applying to positions and no response, or interviewing and 17 days later no reponse, the bs I'm fed by an agency (-"we have TONS of needs") I signed up to offset the hospital cancellations just to pay bills, I'm fed up with this bs line"NOT A GOOD FIT"- in nursing what is that all about- you get a COMPETENT preceptor to make the person a GOOD FIT-nursing administration needs to stop creating more problems just to keep their skanky jobs- most/or as many of them we DON'T need- they collect exorbonent amout of salaries and do the same jobs- have 1 unit manager for 2 units- downsize their labcoats, put the one downsized to back to work in a bedside staff nurse position- lessen that ratio on us. Nursing can't see the forest for the trees any more, nursing creates and perpetuates it's own problems and the higher up in nursing the less competent they are to critical think and problem solve!!!