You know you're Old School when... - Page 6

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    Mar 2, '10 by
    Quote from prettygirllpn
    I'm confused...Could you please explain this? Thanks!
    If I remember correctly (from back in the murk of my brain) this was to culture anerobic bacteria. The burning candle consumed the O2 in the container.
    sevensonnets, canoehead, travelingdeb, and 1 other like this.
  2. Mar 2, '10 by
    Quote from bagladyrn
    If I remember correctly (from back in the murk of my brain) this was to culture anerobic bacteria. The burning candle consumed the O2 in the container.
    Ahh I see. Very interesting! Glad to see I was partially correct too lol
  3. Mar 2, '10 by
    My mother remembers mixing (really beating) infant formula in a kitchen on the floor (very sterile), boiling equipment for 20 minutes to sterilize (needles, tube, etc.) Iv's not in veins but placed under the skin (like big infiltrates), iron lungs, no air conditioning.
    DeLanaHarvickWannabe and mamamerlee like this.
  4. Mar 2, '10 by
    Determining glucose levels by testing the urine. We would put the urine in a test tube then add a pill. Urine would change colour and you would determine glucose level by mathing the colour of the urine to a chart. I remember standing there desperately trying to match the colours up.

    Croup tents

    Humdified O2.

    Huge pillows placed between the legs of pts with hip replacements. Kept their legs spread far apart. You needed 2 nurses to turn because the pillows were so big.

    Smoking in the nursing station. Pts smoking in their rooms. I remember one pt was a quad and had some special apparatus to hold his cigarette - as a student I would have to put the cigaette in and light it. The first time I could not get the lighter to light - the next day my two smoking friends spent their break teaching me how to light a lighter!
    sevensonnets, DeLanaHarvickWannabe, scoochy, and 1 other like this.
  5. Mar 2, '10 by
    Quote from Libitina
    You lot should come work for the NHS. We still have a lot of the things that you miss. Flat sheets, nurses calculating drugs and mixing iv's, no 24hr pharmacy, 18 bed wards, cardex, no aircon...etc....etc....
    Not so much the 18 bed wards but everything else including metal bedpans and drip rate calculations still happen in both Ireland and in the center of excellence that I now work in in Australia! post op sponge for all major surgeries the first evening if they cannot SOOB and onto a shower chair.
    but then on the bright side I work in state(Victoria) with ratios for public hospitals 1 RN for 4 pt

    And the banana bag correct me if I am wrong is a bag of NS with Pabarnix 1 & 11 added to it turning it yellow......a Iv infusion given to alcoholics daily for 3 days on admission to the ward to replace vitamins and minerals lost by their poor diet. Combined with up to 40mg librium QID for DTs (this was happening 2 years ago in a hospital in Ireland!!)
    mamamerlee likes this.
  6. Mar 2, '10 by
    Quote from Pepper The Cat
    Smoking in the nursing station. Pts smoking in their rooms. I remember one pt was a quad and had some special apparatus to hold his cigarette - as a student I would have to put the cigaette in and light it. The first time I could not get the lighter to light - the next day my two smoking friends spent their break teaching me how to light a lighter!
    That is something I do not miss from the "good old days". I'm a non-smoker but sometimes after a shift, my clothes and hair smelled like I'd been in a singles' bar for eight hours. And that was from the patients who smoked.

    Honestly, the staff members I knew who smoked the most were the respiratory therapists! Go figure!
    DeLanaHarvickWannabe, sevensonnets, and Not_A_Hat_Person like this.
  7. Mar 2, '10 by
    Quote from Karenmaire
    And the banana bag correct me if I am wrong is a bag of NS with Pabarnix 1 & 11 added to it turning it yellow......a Iv infusion given to alcoholics daily for 3 days on admission to the ward to replace vitamins and minerals lost by their poor diet. Combined with up to 40mg librium QID for DTs (this was happening 2 years ago in a hospital in Ireland!!)
    Thank you so much for explaining the banana bag. I really wondered what that was!
  8. Mar 2, '10 by
    Quote from retiredlady
    Iv's not in veins but placed under the skin (like big infiltrates).
    Clysis.

    Who remembers nurses wearing starched white dresses with belt at the waist, started high hat, hard Clinic shoes,and the blue & red wool cape? OH, and you never left home without your school pin.
    sevensonnets, scoochy, BanoraWhite, and 1 other like this.
  9. Mar 2, '10 by
    My teacher once told me that back in her day that to test for any UTI's, the nurses would boil the urine, and if it congealed, it meant infection was present ? Yikes.
    Not_A_Hat_Person likes this.
  10. Mar 2, '10 by
    Quote from Cul2
    "String of cups on all males who just had prostate surgery..."

    Would somebody explain this?
    That was to see the progression of urine from reddish to pink-tinged.