i see so many threads on here about people dreading clinical, complaining about clinical, etc etc... what about those of us that love it?
i am a third quarter adn student. this quarter is my first "real" clinical. first quarter we just did head to toe assessments. second quarter we were supposed to be doing po meds and injections (ob clinical) but the census was low and i never got to do any of that. prior to today, the most i had ever done on a patient was a head to toe assessment. this quarter i am on a cardiac intermediate unit. today was my first day i was assigned a patient. my clinical instructor / nurse pretty much let me do my thing and only stepped in to remind me or something that needed done. great lesson in patient management. i admire the nurses that handle 6-7 patients.
my patient today was admitted with dyspnea. he has pitting edema and vascular browning on his shins/feet from peripheral artery disease. he also has chf, right coronary artery disease, and lad stenosis. however, his ejection fraction was great! he's scheduled for open heart surgery on tuesday.
i took his morning blood sugar and it was wnl. i did, however, have to give him 8 po meds for a garden variety of problems. he also got lovenox subq. the doctor also put him on ancef iv (just in case his legs were infected). he had a picc line, but nothing was hooked up so i had to do that for the first time! one of his lumens was clotted off (wouldn't aspirate or flush) so we had to use the other one. when it was done, i had to d/c it and flush the picc again. his lunchtime blood sugar was higher so i had to use the sliding scale and administer insulin. later, the doctor wanted his foley taken out and a ua c&s done to check for a uti so i had to learn how to draw urine out of the tubing of the foley and then took it out. then he had lasix iv due and i gave that iv push. later that afternoon, they were taking out his picc line and starting a peripheral iv and that was really neat to watch. i also got to remove a peripheral iv that was infiltrated of another patient and attempted (and failed) to start an iv.
i loved clinical today and i thought i did and learned a ton! this was only day #1 - i can't imagine what next week holds! :)
just thought i'd share a happy story about a new and eager nursing student!
