My peds class is stupid..

[Scrubz]

In lecture I supose we're learning whatever it is you're supposed to learn in peds, and that's alright, but my clinicals are a complete joke. Here's what we're doing now... Going to a local church nursery where there are generally healthy kids, and watching them, observing growth and development among certain age groups... aka babysitting... Yeah, it's growth and development. I could get this stuff from a book. Sure it's fun playing with these kids, and watching (got to watch toddlers.. ) but for the sake of doing this in a nursing program? I wanted to be doing REAL peds nursing stuff.

And for the record, throughout all of peds we'll never get to do hands-on stuff. So no use in asking if this is just a beginning phase.

I guess it's good because it'll be an easy A, but I'd rather have gotten a B in a tougher class where I learned more.. Seriously... Well, maybe not a B, but you know what I mean!

Anyone else have a similar problem?

[not now, RN]

I did kind of the same thing in LVN school. We watched the kids at the on campus daycare, best three days of my semester! A break to play with toys and watercolor! The reason it happened that way was that there is one hospital in town and it has a peds unit that frequently closes for days on end because it has no patients (they get sent to the children's hospital). When it is open RN students get in first.

The next hospital is an hour away and only students from that city's community college can do clinic at that facility (my LVN to RN psyc rotation got moved to an hour and a half away because of that policy!).

We have a major children's hospital two hours from school that we did a day long tour at but that hospital only allows the university to do clinic because they only hire BSN nurses so having anyone else there is a waste of time and space for them.

[Lisa CCU RN, RN]

We do that kind of stuff the first half of the semester, but I wouldn't call it a joke. We are going to be giving Denver II tests in addition to "playing" with the kids. We also have a day where we work with a school nurse and we conduct a safety fair as preventative measures are important in nursing too.

Watching and seeing how a normal child develops IS important because how will you know when the child is having trouble?

At out school, the second half of the semester is acute care nursing.

[jov]

my clinicals are a complete joke. Here's what we're doing now... Going to a local church nursery where there are generally healthy kids, and watching them, observing growth and development among certain age groups... aka babysitting... I wanted to be doing REAL peds nursing stuff.

man, that's so sad. I just started my peds rotation and we will be on the unit, doing meds and all.

[Scrubz]

Actually the 2nd half of our semester is OB. And still, no hands-on, just observing. Hopefully my med-surg classes will teach me more. Then when I go back for my BRN maybe I'll learn more. But I'm sure most of my learning will come from my first few years as an RN.

But I want to work med-surg for a year, then go to an ICU, or SICU, or maybe ER. And I'm in my 2nd semester of nursing and all I know how to do is give shots, catheter, NG, and all that fundamental stuff. I want to learn because I want to be good, not just get a degree..

[Bonny619]

Our peds clinical was very much observing as well. We were mainly on an orthopedic floor, but we were able to float to PACU, NICU, PICU and Hem/Onc. The nurse I was with in PICU let me do a lot of hands on stuff, like suctioning and I would pull meds up from the vials for her.

[RN BSN 2009]

Our peds is at a local hospital

[BSN74]

Shortly into my peds rotation, I caught measles from one of the kids! Boy,was I sick!:rotfl:

[NeosynephRN]

I start Ped's in a couple weeks...I am doing OB right now...we are going to be in a reg ped's unit doing complete patient care...we will also be going for a day in the NICU and PICU!!!

[jov]

Shortly into my peds rotation, I caught measles from one of the kids! Boy,was I sick!:rotfl:

off topic but didn't you have to have titers done before your clinicals?

[Megsd, BSN, RN]

The rumor mill at my school is that we'll be in schools doing vision and hearing screenings for half the clinical and in the hospital the other half. I have also heard the hospital stuff will be mostly observing, which I am frustrated by. But we'll see... maybe we'll get to do a little bit.

[RNsRWe, ASN, RN]

Actually, it isn't stupid at all.

Not every nursing school is situated near hospitals that cater to enough peds to make it a worthwhile hospital-based clinical rotation for you. But that doesn't mean you won't get a chance to learn!

One of our peds rotations was to go to a HeadStart program for just one day and do preschool health screenings: BP, h/w, eye/ear tests. You might have that opportunity, if you're lucky.

Observing what are SUPPOSED to be typical, healthy children will assist you firstly in knowing what typical, healthy children act like, how they interact with each other and with adults. Unless you're the parent of a few of these , you really DON'T know, even if you've done babysitting. And even then, maybe not.

Observing from a CLINICAL perspective is quite different from either babysitting or watching your own kids. Review the stages of development in your nursing texts and psych books before going in. And don't be surprised if you find something unusual.

What I mean is, if you have the opportunity to watch "from the outside in" for a few hours, you might just pick up on the child who as NOT typical, yet no one is noticing that. You might just find one child who is not interacting appropriately, has physical or emotional issues that are just not being addressed. That happened during my rotation, in which I went to the college's daycare and just sat there watching the groups at work. I move about the room from time to time to watch different kids in different settings. And I found one child who concerned me in how he played, interacted and such. I used this child in my paper to be submitted, and discussed my concerns with the instructor. She felt my concerns were well-founded, and would do what she could to get the child an evaluation. What started out as a useless (in my formerly ignorant opinion) exercise turned out to benefit not just me but that child as well.

Point is, no experience is stupid unless you are determined to not learn anything from it. Peds isn't just figuring out how to give a screaming child a shot. Make it a point to learn everything you can!