Getting through a clinical experience you hate

Nursing Students General Students

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Although we are only in the EFC for a short time, I really hate being there. Any suggestions to just get through it?

Kris

Specializes in Peri-op/Sub-Acute ANP.

The only thing I can suggest is that every day you are there you have to keep your eye on the prize and consider it a day closer to graduation.

Hang in!

Specializes in Med/Surg, Tele, IM, OB/GYN, neuro, GI.

I hated that rotation too (stemmed from my grandmother's treatment at one). It was even worse because there were three different clincal classes their including us so there was nothing to do. I just tried to find the one patient that needed help and spent as much time as I could with them. I did the stuff that no one wanted to do (feeding, bed baths, etc). It got so bad at the end I would fill up all of the linen carts and started cleaning out storage closets. Once me and my clinical partner cleaned a walk in closet out (with the door shut) that had clothes and other things from patients that had passed but were keep in case someone else needed it. We basically just kept as busy as we could to make the time go faster. Last day of clinicals we told the instructor that we hated it and she just smiled and said I hated it too.

Thank you both. I'm just going to grin and bear it for this week and NEVER look back. For all of you out there that like to work with geriatric patients in an EFC, God Bless you...I just can't.

Kris

Specializes in critical care and LTC.

Maybe find someone who has some interesting pictures on the wall and talk to them about it. Just because these people are elderly and frail doesn't mean they don't have amazing stories to tell. That could be the one thing that changes your mind and makes you love working with the elderly. These people have lived a long time and given up everything to live in a tiny room usually with a roommate and are distanced from the outside community maybe if you talk with someone instead of cleaning out closets your day will go faster. If you live where the weather is nice take some one out front, push them around the building you'll probably enjoy it! I don't like working in LTC but these people have amazing stories to tell. And a good nurse knows how to listen.

Specializes in Med Surg, Hospice.

It is hard. I tried to make the best of it. I talked to the residents when I helped them get dressed and bathed. The hardest part is the down time when all of the beds are made, everyone is fed, the linens are passed, and you're not permitted to pass meds yet. I always took my assigned residents to the activities that the facility had. The time passed faster that way.

On the bright side of that clinical though.. I got to hear some really interesting stories and met some really great people that I never would have gotten the chance to meet had I not been assigned there. But, it was still hard. LTC breaks my heart. We go back for Level 3 after the Med Surg rotation. It is a much longer rotation this time around. Last time, we were only there for 18 days.

Although we are only in the EFC for a short time, I really hate being there. Any suggestions to just get through it?

Kris

What's EFC?

:sofahider

What's EFC?

:sofahider

sorry, got my letters mixed up...ECF is what I meant to write...Extended Care Facility

Specializes in Going to the ER!.

I dreaded that experience and hated it. We went to a "dumping ground" where it was just giant pressure ulcers and people laying in feces unturned. gah. The hospital setting is much different. hang in there.

Specializes in Family Nurse Practitioner.

It wasn't my cup of tea either but I tried to make a difference in a couple of lives even if only for a few hours. Hang in there.

It wasn't my cup of tea either but I tried to make a difference in a couple of lives even if only for a few hours. Hang in there.

Great suggestion...When I think about it, it is only like 6 hours that I have to deal with it...the other time is either preconference or post-conference.

Kris

Specializes in Family Nurse Practitioner.
Great suggestion...When I think about it, it is only like 6 hours that I have to deal with it...the other time is either preconference or post-conference.

Kris

Maybe its denial but if I focus on it too much it would make me miserable especially because my school has had a way of resurecting the LTC experience during different modules under different names, ie. post-op, "rehab", critical care...on a geriatric hospital unit etc.

:madface:

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