New male nurse student and assessment skills

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Well, from the more experienced nurses and further along students (I'm only on my 3rd day); how did you all learn to memorize the process in a head to toe assessment? Reading about it, it seems so memory intensive and I'm a little overwhelmed by it all. Also, other male students, did you guys have any issues getting hands on experience in the mother/baby semester?

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By the way, the topic was meant to say "student" but my iPhone keyboard is too small.

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Specializes in Adult Internal Medicine.
Well from the more experienced nurses and further along students (I'm only on my 3rd day); how did you all learn to memorize the process in a head to toe assessment? Reading about it, it seems so memory intensive and I'm a little overwhelmed by it all. Also, other male students, did you guys have any issues getting hands on experience in the mother/baby semester?[/quote']

For assessment the best way to do it is practice practice practice. Work with a partner, practice on a sim-man in skills labs, talk through it when you are alone, do full head-to-toe on your ward patients. A good assessment technique is a strong foundation for the rest of your career. As you get more comfortable with doing full assessments begin to get comfortable with the normal: initially you want to simply identify normal vs abnormal. You won't know initially that you are listening to an S3 or a pansystolic EM you will just know its not "right"; ask for backup and they can help you identify what you hear. Or see. Or feel.

Personally I had no problems with maternity. In fact, ingot to see and do far more than my female colleagues.

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For assessment the best way to do it is practice practice practice. Work with a partner, practice on a sim-man in skills labs, talk through it when you are alone, do full head-to-toe on your ward patients. A good assessment technique is a strong foundation for the rest of your career. As you get more comfortable with doing full assessments begin to get comfortable with the normal: initially you want to simply identify normal vs abnormal. You won't know initially that you are listening to an S3 or a pansystolic EM you will just know its not "right"; ask for backup and they can help you identify what you hear. Or see. Or feel.

Personally I had no problems with maternity. In fact, ingot to see and do far more than my female colleagues.

OK. Thank you. That does help out and I love hearing from someone who is thorough like you've been with me. We have a sim-man in our lab and I fully intend on working on my family and friends.

Also, that's kind of surprising about you being afforded more opportunities than your female counterparts. I thought this would be a field-wide issue. I hope that I can get the same opportunity to learn as everyone else.

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Specializes in Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation.

The head-to-toe looks quite long, but before you know it, you will have it memorized. Just practicing it will help you memorize it more. I never really practiced on a friend, but I did at clinicals cuz we were required to do it twice a shift. I remember my first one was timed and took me like 25 minutes, but I hit every assessment during my first semester. By the end, I could do it in less than 10 minutes on a patient. Once you have it down, your assessments speed up because you can see, feel, or hear it right when you attend to your patient and don't even need to ask.

As for maternity and peds, I start next week...so I'll let you know then how it fairs for me haha.

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Sounds good. I'm so apprehensive right now!! I just want to start with the heavy lab and clinical stuff (words I'm sure ill be eating before long) but I just really want to do some more things.

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Well right now I'm just really apprehensive about getting at work in the lab and clinical. However, I'm not sure about the whole thing. I love working with kids and it would really disappoint me to be shut out of that.

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Specializes in Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation.
I love working with kids and it would really disappoint me to be shut out of that.

There's always somewhere else you can go into :D

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Well right now I'm just really apprehensive about getting at work in the lab and clinical. However I'm not sure about the whole thing. I love working with kids and it would really disappoint me to be shut out of that.[/quote']

Health assessment has got to be one of the most important classes. I always hear, "A nurse that cannot assess, isn't much of a nurse". You might or might not see some RNs NOT perform assessments (scary).What you WILL see are focused assessments.

My advice follows what everyone else suggested. Practice Practice Practice. I personally took a systemic approach. Quite literally from Head to Toe. I typed up everything in a nice systemically organized list. I would give the list to friends and family and have them check off what I missed. This way they don't interrupt my train of thought and my assessment flows nicely.

As far as obstetrics, my program runs through all the adult health (medsurg I II & III), then we are introduced into obstetrics and pediatrics. I'm entering OB as well. I'm just a tad nervous. I'm from the south and well ... you know.

I actually initiated a forum regarding this issue, refer to nursing-nursing specialties-OBGYN... or much easier than that ... check out my *Thread* history and find the recent thread regarding OB.

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Specializes in NICU.

Assessments are how you maintain a relationship during nursing school. Practicing your assessment skills on your significant other as much as possible. ;) The more you practice on the female body, the more comfortable and confident you will be on a real female patient.

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Specializes in CCRN, ED, Unit Manager.
Well, from the more experienced nurses and further along students (I'm only on my 3rd day); how did you all learn to memorize the process in a head to toe assessment? Reading about it, it seems so memory intensive and I'm a little overwhelmed by it all. Also, other male students, did you guys have any issues getting hands on experience in the mother/baby semester?

1.) I'd stare at a body part of a patient and ask "Did I do everything I could go with this body part?" before moving on. Don't take that with any sexual connotations, lol.

2.) No, except for 1 husband who didn't want me to see his wife breast feed. With all due respect to his wife, he was doing me a huge favor. His intimidation was completely unwarranted.

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