Advice for a New Pediatric Hematology/Oncology RN

DisneyNurseGal, BSN, RN · Sep 30, 2019

CONGRATS. Pediatric Oncology is my passion, and I love taking care of this population! Couple words of advice.

1) SELF CARE. We see some stuff. Its going to be hard. You can't take care of them if you don't take care of yourself.

2) Celebrate the "wins", Remissions, completing treatment regimens, all need to be celebrated. In this field, one of the ways to manage the bad stuff is to celebrate the good.

3) Boundaries. Make sure you are establishing boundaries with your patients. Don't give out personal cell phone numbers, don't make a habit of socializing outside of work. Most importantly, you can not give financially to every patient, even though you will want to. Supporting them buy buying their tee shirts, key chains etc is ok. But be prepared, if you do for one, you should do for all. Parents remember, and it can make it awkward if you're spotted in one patient's swag and another realizes you didn't buy from them.

4) Come to terms with death and dying yourself. Make sure you do not have any unresolved issues regarding a loved ones passing. Are you comfortable talking about death?

This is all I can think of for now. I hope you love this practice as much as I do. Good luck!

Nurse.Kelsey, BSN, RN · Oct 16, 2019

On 9/30/2019 at 2:18 PM, DisneyNurseGal said:
CONGRATS. Pediatric Oncology is my passion, and I love taking care of this population! Couple words of advice.
1) SELF CARE. We see some stuff. Its going to be hard. You can't take care of them if you don't take care of yourself.
2) Celebrate the "wins", Remissions, completing treatment regimens, all need to be celebrated. In this field, one of the ways to manage the bad stuff is to celebrate the good.
3) Boundaries. Make sure you are establishing boundaries with your patients. Don't give out personal cell phone numbers, don't make a habit of socializing outside of work. Most importantly, you can not give financially to every patient, even though you will want to. Supporting them buy buying their tee shirts, key chains etc is ok. But be prepared, if you do for one, you should do for all. Parents remember, and it can make it awkward if you're spotted in one patient's swag and another realizes you didn't buy from them.
4) Come to terms with death and dying yourself. Make sure you do not have any unresolved issues regarding a loved ones passing. Are you comfortable talking about death?
This is all I can think of for now. I hope you love this practice as much as I do. Good luck!

Oh my gosh @DisneyNurseGal I am sorry it took so long for me to see your response!!! I never got a notification ? !

Thank you so much for your perspective. As an LPN I did home health with peds, so the whole time throughout RN school I knew I would want to work in peds in the hospital setting. Also, I did 3 months of crisis care hospice as an LPN. My RN preceptorship was with a peds hem/onc RN and I knew it was a speciality I would consider with peds.

I know I am going to have to find the balance where I make sure I am doing self care.

And yes, of course with the boundaries! It can be a fine line between professional and personal boundaries especially with these special patients... but yes it is necessary.

Regarding death and dying... I think I can say that I am comfortable talking about it.

I know overall this is going to be a very new, eye-opening, experience for me. I know Ill learn a lot. Im excited and honored to start this journey.

Guests · Jan 14, 2020

Hats off to Peds Hem/Onc- I can't even imagine working on that unit, especially now that I am a mother.