No need to be upset at the truth! Change careers - Page 5

LOL OH PLEASE. I LOVE patient care. I LOVE what I do. I don't love being treated like a disposable commodity, instead of a human being. I don't love when people treat me with disrespect like I'm a slave or worse, and I don't love unsafe working conditions that make work unpleasant and make patients unsafe. If you're complacent and okay with unsafe working conditions and poor patient care, please continue to hold our profession back and accept being treated like a customer service rep with a stethoscope. For myself, I'll keep trying to make nursing what I know it can be, mostly pleasant and rewarding, and most of all, safe care for patients.

lol oh please. i love patient care. i love what i do. i don't love being treated like a disposable commodity, instead of a human being. i don't love when people treat me with disrespect like i'm a slave or worse, and i don't love unsafe working conditions that make work unpleasant and make patients unsafe. if you're complacent and okay with unsafe working conditions and poor patient care, please continue to hold our profession back and accept being treated like a customer service rep with a stethoscope. for myself, i'll keep trying to make nursing what i know it can be, mostly pleasant and rewarding, and most of all, safe care for patients.

There are people here who love to complain about their jobs who are on chemo, too. If you don't like what you read, the answer is not to stifle other people from expressing themselves. Don't read them. There are lots of positivity threads here for you.. . and a functional ignore button so you won't even need to see posts from people who offend you.

Thanks for the kind words beeker I dunno if it is harder, just different.

One case sticks out in my mind.

A young beautiful sweet blue eyed husky. He developed a pyothorax (foreign body?), needed a thoracotomy, lung lobectomy. He was the best patient ever pre op. His owners scraped up the thousands of dollars for his surgery, they wanted to save their beloved family member! It was a struggle for them.

I recovered him post median sternotomy (ouch!) he was stable intraop (needed some cells) and initially did well. SHortly post op he goes from wagging his tail at me, to pallor before my eyes. It is 2 am. His bp's drop. I am aspirating blood from his chest tube. Within minutes my faculty is there, we are pumping units into this beautiful dog as quickly as he bleeds. He dies right before my eyes. One minute he is looking at me with those beautiful blues, giving kisses, then next he is coding and I am bagging him with a bain circuit filling with blood until the owners can come say goodbye. What caused his hemorrhage, don't know, maybe he was a Von Willebrand dog, will never know. The owners could not take him back to surgery. They were out of money I cried right along side them as they euthanized him. I put everything I had into saving their family member. It was emotionally exhausting, still brings tears to my eyes. These are moments I experience working in ICU, most of my patients die. BUT, I am there to deliver the best care I can to my patients.

We all practice under the umbrella of medicine. We advocate for our patients, and hopefully give our patients the best care we can under the circumstances given to us. So yes, I do the job I do because I love critical care, and medicine. Does it suck at times, absolutely, will being a registered nurse be even worse, it sounds like it I am not naive in that, believe me.

And, sorry to be long winded, I am lucky too have a wonderful job, making the same salary as many nurses on this board, with full benefits. Not all new (or potential) nurses are making career choices uniformed, or solely for the money. Unfortunately, I have advanced as far as I can in my current position. I cannot leave my position at the university and still make the same salary, essentially there is not a lot of room for growth. That is why am making the informed decision to enter nursing, for lateral mobility and professional growth. In othere words, there is no masters degree available, and no, I do not want to be a vet! (do NP's want to be Md's?) LOL

Everyday I suffer through twenty pages of documentation, that no one will ever read (except auditors), to get to the sick people on the other side. That IS passion.