[lilyflow]

Hi I am new and I have been on the red carpet today in front of my supervisor and her supervisor about mistakes I have made working in the lab in our clinic. How can I not make mistakes> What pressure. Help

[EricEnfermero]

I'm really sorry to hear about your day! I think we all go into nursing (at least partially) with an ideal of helping people, so when we get called out for mistakes, especially ones that might compromise patient care, it can be a real nightmare for us. Hang in there!

[Tweety]

It's important to stay focused and calm (yeah right but at least focused).

The important thing is you honestly look at your mistakes, where did you go wrong? Learn from that. Forgive yourself and move on.

Welcome to Allnurses. Good luck to you.

[nambour51]

We all make mistakes. It is what we do about them that is important. A mistake does not make you incompetent, not learning from mistakes does. Tweeety's advice is sound - are mistakes occurring because of your personal practise or are they occurring because of the system? Do you need to change your practise or work at changing the system?

[lilyflow]

I feel like everything I do can be a potential mistake, I need to take my job serously but not myself. How do I do that?

[nambour51]

Keep things in perspective. Examine the history of your mistakes and try and identify what is the underlying problem. How many mistakes have you actually made? How often have you made mistakes? Not everything you do is a mistake - consider how many times do you do things correctly - are you really making that many mistakes? How many others make mistakes? What can you learn from those who don't seem to make mistakes? What mistakes are you actually making? Are you repeating any mistakes? When have these mistakes occurred - at what stage in your shift? When you are tired, hungry, rushed? Why are these mistakes occurring - lack of training, lack of experience, lack of organisation on the clinics part, lack of organisation on your part, lack of concentration? You are on a learning curve so don't be surprised if you do make a mistake. You will become more confident as your skills develope with experience.