[mimimartina]

I am finally in my 1st semester of nursing school. We have just started going to clinicals. The information we have to go and get the day prior to, put together, research,etc. is unbelievable ! I am a LPN, and do not remember this being so intense. Maybe its been too long (15 years ago), but I absolutely do not remember doing care plans. My instructor expects me to remember everything. I never worked in a hospital, and don't really even know how to find the information I'm looking for. I want to drop out ! My family is freaked out because I've been after this for so long. Do RNs really and truly do care plans like this on the job? If so, I don't know if I will make it in the "real world". Any tips for clinicals would be appreciated. Going out of town for a couple of days, hope it helps to calm my nerves,,,I'm going dowwwwnnnnn.

[elkpark]

It's safe to say that there's no facility in the "real world" where RNs write care plans as detailed as the ones you're expected to produce in school -- but, in most places, we do write care plans.

The point of writing care plans in school is that they are a tool to help you learn to think about clients and their needs and how nursing can address them, and a tool for your instructor to be able to see how you are gathering and processing info about your client(s). It is a process that practicing RNs do, in an abbreviated form, in our heads.

Everyone struggles with them at first, but they'll get easier as you go. I can't swear to it, but I'm guessing that you didn't have to do them in LPN school because "planning and directing care" is an RN role and not an LPN role (and I hasten to say that I mean no insult or disrespect to LPNs by that; just that it is a legal/administrative "scope of practice" issue -- RNs are responsible for "planning and directing care" in most jurisdictions, and LPNs aren't).

Hang in there!

[CritterLover]

Well, lets face it: not very many people love nursing school. I'm sure there are those folks out there, but most just work on getting through it.

There is so much to learn, to prepare us for a job with so much responsibility.

Hang in there. I susupect that if you are already an LPN, you have a pretty good idea of what you are getting into.

As for careplans, in the "real world," most of the careplans are pre-printed according to dx or problem, with rationale included, and you select the appropriate options for your patient.

So while it is part of our job, as RNs, to develope/edit plans of care for our patients, it isn't all that time consuming.

As for being expected to know everything, think of it this way: you are only going to retain a certain percentage of what you learn now. You won't remember it all forever, but the more you absorb now, the more you'll hang onto.

[baileysmom07]

I am in LPN school and we do care plans weekly. We have to do 3 diagnoses with several interventions, goals, and evaluations. We have done them since we started our first clinical at a long term assisted living facility. I still do not like doing them. They come back with red ink all over them....

[Happy TBA Nurse]

At my facility care plans are computerized and they prompt you based on the diagnosis. Much easier than hand writing them!

[NickiLaughs]

Nobody likes care plans in my experience. You really won't be writing them out like that after finishing school, they have computerized programs post-school usually. And it will never be that detailed.
Just have to stick it out and jump through the hoops they want you to do. It will be worth it in the end. I honestly think the careplans are to help you critically think about patient care more than anything.
Good luck!

[dsoginer]

I just got home from clinicals and have to finish my care plan. Nursing school is hard, otherwise we would have less than capable people taking care of you and yours. We all wondered what we were getting into that first month or more. It gets better it really does but if you are not willing to put in the time and effort then you will not make it. You have to want to give up your life as you know it while in school in order to have this career.

Good luck

[mimimartina]

Thanks for all the replies..I'm feeling somewhat better,,even though I've yet to get one of my care plans reviewed by my instructor yet. Only 4 weeks left of this semester,,,and I'm still hanging in there !

[dsoginer]

I have a wonderful Care Plan templete to share. The teachers love it and it improved my plans by at least 50% (and my grades). You can move it around, change sizes, etc. and once again, I found the original link on this website.

If you need help with it let me know.

[dsoginer]

Let me send it in Word 2003.