lilypad2424. . .I am the Queen of Organization! Before I went to nursing school I was a bookkeeper with two years of Accounting classes under my belt prior to that. Everything has it's place.
Here is the last "brains", or report sheet, I used as a working clinical RN: Attachment 5032. The actual one I used had the telephone numbers and extension numbers of doctors or departments I had to call on a regular basis so I didn't have to waste time looking them up every time I needed them. I kept this sheet in a Word file on my computer and just printed out a new sheet before I left for work each day. You'll notice the date in the right hand corner. That was there for a very deliberate reason. I could never remember the date, so I started printing it on my sheets and always knew where to look to find the date. I also carried a clip board around that I kept this sheet on. The clip board had a copy of the hospital hypoglycemic protocol and the fire protocol on it so I could refer to them and follow them exactly. I also created for myself a special sheet on what to do when a patient had chest pain because when I would sit down to chart realized I had forgotten to do one thing or another. I laminated this sheet and pulled it to the top of my clipboard and just followed my own directions which also included what I should chart. Because we were required to time strip IV bags, I created a template from an empty IV bag and a calculator using ratios to mark off IV bags for 60, 75, 80, and 125cc's an hour on a piece of paper. I put the paper into a heavy plastic sheet protector. All I had to do was place a piece of paper tape on the plastic sheet next to the IV rate I needed to mark, tick off the hourly increments, fill in the hours by the tick marks on the tape and slap it on the IV bag. This was kept on my clipboard too. On the back of my ID badge I wrote the normal values of the electrolytes, Digoxin level, Vancomycin levels and ABGs on a piece of paper which I stuck on with a piece of Tegaderm. All I had to do was flip it up and look down to see these numbers--everyone will think you're a genius and remember everything! I never wore a wristwatch either. I bought a lapel watch which I attached to my ID badge. All you have to do is look down and there is the time. I made my own uniforms (because the off-the-rack whites are made of such thin material!) of white poplin, which is basically white denim or pastel Weaver's cloth for the tops. I made sure my pockets were BIG. 9 inches by 9 inches to be exact. They held a flashlight that had 2-C-size batteries in them (I worked night shift), and a whole bunch of other stuff. I also doubled the material on the pockets so they wouldn't wear through from all the junk I carried in them. Carry a fistful of alcohol wipes in your pocket. Carry a fistful of needles (or Safe-Site access jobbies) in your pocket for IVPBs. Carry a couple of syringes in your pockets too. Saves running back to the med cart for them when you need to do some maintenance on an IV. Ask central supply for an old pair of hemostats--I always carried two pairs and used them like they were pliers (you men ought to appreciate this!) to get IV and other tubing connections apart. I also used to save back a couple of the rubber needle sheaths that come on the pre-filled Tubex cartridges to use as covers for the tips of my hemostats. It prevents the threading on the hemostats from digging into the IV tubings and possibly tearing a hole in them (which means you have to do a complete IV tubing change).
You should post this question on the General Nursing Discussion Forum.
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