Nurses Helping Nurses
allnurses Network: Central | Jobs | Books | Newsletter
allnurses: A Nursing Community for Nurses
Home General News Blogs Articles Students Region Specialty Degrees F.A.Q.
Medical-Surgical Nursing /

Rehab/LTC nurse to Med/Surg nurse: advise please



Did You Know?
allnurses is the largest community for nurses on the web. We now have over 388,023 members! Join today to network with other nurses, laugh, share, and much more.

Aug 25, 2009 08:00 PM

Rehab/LTC nurse to Med/Surg nurse: advise please

by ws582

Could anyone whose gone from Rehab/LTC nursing (dealing with 20 to 30 patients) and moved to Med/Surg nursing (with 6+ patients) please give their opinion of which suited them better? I work on a subacute unit in rehabilitation and average 20 patients. On a typical day, I might have 2 IV therapy, 2 traches, 2 GT, and many on NEB treatments. Quite a few of the 20, only require their scheduled and PRN meds, but I still find this many patients so overwhelming. Most of them are on so many meds, charting has to be done on 75% of them, and then there's always the time consuming complications that come up. The nurses I work with say if I can handle this, I can handle Med/Surg at a hospital, but I think those patients are typically more acute (although we get some very acute patients in the unit I'm at). I'd love to hear your opinion, because I'm very interested in working at a hospital and am wondering how it will differ. Do you feel you're able to better care for 6+ acute patients than 20 sub-acute? Which did you feel was more stressful? Thank you so much


Share

Search Tags
None
Top

 
Advertisement
Sponsored Links
 
Reply
2 Comments
No. 1
from husker_rn
Old Sep 02, 2009, 08:25 PM

Default Re: Rehab/LTC nurse to Med/Surg nurse: advise please
I went back to med-surg after a couple years in LTC. If you can handle LTC, you can handle med-surg. Yes some of my patients are acute but so were my fragile old folks. And after being responsible for 30 + residents, my teams of 5-6 patients is quite doable. Good luck !!
Top
 
No. 2
from ws582
Old Sep 03, 2009, 04:59 AM

Default Re: Rehab/LTC nurse to Med/Surg nurse: advise please
That's so wonderful to hear. Thank you!
Top
 
Reply




Thread Tools


Who's Online
260 members
2,458 guests
2,718

3

California Imposes Stricter Rules Regarding Drug Abuse In...

5

Are older nurses being forced out of the profession?

0

An outlook in California?

8

Australian surgeons successfully separate conjoined twins

40

Disruptive behavior by doctors, nurses persists a year...

31

Woman sues after police tackle her in ER during premature...

5

Beyond The Last Lecture -For Randy & Jai Pausch nurses...

16

WHO: Give at-risk groups anti-flu drugs early

21

Nursing, medical schools should work together, experts say

6

Army nurse honored after 100th birthday






Currently Reading This Page: 1 (0 members & 1 guests)

Interested in the hottest topics of the week? Subscribe to the Nurse-zine Newsletter.
Enter email address: