any advice?

[dmw2489]

Hello everyone, I am a senior nursing student taking Med Surg I. I just am in need of some advice on how to be more proficient in clinicals, I am a good student Ive never gotten below an 85 on a test (mental health was not a strong point for me lol) and it seems that I am on the right track at putting information together and linking it. I also seem to have a good grasp on care plans and relating them to my patient.

My biggest problem seems to be that when I am on clinicals and encounter something its like everything that is in my brain flies out and i dont know what to do. For example one of my patients complained of abdominal pain. I asked her about her pain, like where it was, how bad it is, what it felt like ect. but then after the primary nurse came in to check more about the pain i realized i forgot to ask her if she has even been moving her bowels. (BTW the patient did not have any condition relating to abdominal.) But even worse than that i didnt even put it together until later in the day that the pain meds she had ordered for her back were probably the cause of her abdominal pain (she had not moved her bowels in two days which was abnormal for her)...

I just am not sure on how to help these kinds of things, does it come with time? is there anything i can do to help or make this better? I know that I am always nervous on clinicals and i feel that makes it worse but I dont know how I can start to resolve this issue. Any suggestions would be so helpful!! thank you :)

[ParkerBC,MSN,RN, PhD, RN]

Listen, I think you are trying to hold yourself to a very high standard. While I do think it is important to have high standards, I also think it is unhealthy to hold oneself to standards that are unachievable. There are nurses on my floor with 20 years of experience who still ask questions about assessment findings. When someone comes into the ED, why do you suppose the doctor has a list of Dx’s? There may be five or six Dx that are being “ruled out”. You are going to find that after you graduate and become a nurse, you were merely prepared as a generalist and a very basic one at that. It is OKAY that you did not make that connection. I bet the next time you come across a patient complaining of abdominal pain; you will check his/her medication list for pain medications. You had a good learning experience. Chalk it up as such :-)

[lovescoffee]

I completely agree with the above post! Everything comes with time. The more you learn and the longer you use it the faster you will put the pieces together in the clinical setting! I have these "duh" moments all the time!

[dmw2489]

Thank you both so much!! It feels good to hear that what im doing is ok and normal... I get so uptight especially with how are clinical instructors are, its like i have all of the information but within a second poof its gone. But thank you again for the encouraging words :)