Lvn from fl

[Jayinaz]

I transferred from Florida where I was an LVN but I went to LPN school actually in Dallas and I transferred my license to Florida and I worked in Kansas City and I worked in Missouri Kansas City Kansas and Kansas City Missouri. I also worked in Iowa as an LPN.

Each state is different on what an LPN can do. In the state of Kansas LPNs can be IV certified but not allowed to even touch him but they want you to have that experience or training. When I worked at the hospital in Kansas we weren't allowed to do anything with IVs that have to be a registered nurse even though they wanted us to be IV certified in Missouri. It was pretty much the same and when I worked in Florida Kansas Missouri Iowa, if you worked in the hospital if we took a verbal order or telephone order. We had to have a registered nurse cosine.

Now when I worked in a nursing home course, depending on the level of care, and the state of Kansas a Medicare unit has to have an RN around the clock. So I worked on the Assisted Living unit during the day and I did everything that I was within my scope in the state of Kansas. Then when I worked in Missouri it was a little different; we have an RN House supervisor but we can still charge the Medicare unit.

I didn't really enjoy skilled nursing anyway. I worked as the director of nursing services for an assisted living facility and it was funny because being the director I was on call 24/7. We were had to be connected to a skilled facility because on evenings and nights they can have a medication aide as the charge person but of course depending on the policy in the state they even allowed medication aides or technicians.

Depend on what state could take telephone orders could transcribe orders document in the patient charts. So we got a video and have them sit down and then for like 2 weeks stearate I had to follow them around when they did call. The doctor be on the other line but they could not sign the telephone orders I had to sign up. So if they took a telephone order usually I would request them to take it over to the skilled side and not even call the doctor let the nurse to inform the nurse of the problem and let the nurse on the other side.

But sometimes the nurses didn't want to do it and if the med-tech or the Medicaid took a telephone order I made sure that they knew how to transcribe it but they were not allowed to sign the order. They can go ahead and write it out leave it there for me to review it and sign it.

As for refilling prescriptions new orders they would call me at home and read back to me what the doctor said and I would call the pharmacy if it was a new order. Who is a refill we would just peel the label off them at the med Bend pill card and they would fax it to the pharmacy. If the doctor sent orders over we have a copy machine and it was written already out and it wasn't a telephone order, they could fax it to the pharmacy. I wouldn't have to do it they could transcribe it but I still had to go behind them and initial it.

They usually try to do with missions if I knew a new admit was coming in I already have the new orders faxed to the pharmacy. We had a computer for the nursing home that I worked at and we have a unit clerk that would do the orders in the computer and it would print out the mar physician order sheet treatment sheet admission sheet and they could do like an admission note. But usually I did that but it was funny because our director of nursing she did not want to have another nurse on evenings on the Assisted Living unit so she wanted to be cheaply -- scuse me and nothing against Medicaid or med techs, but I don't believe they should be doing certain things.

But that was approved by the division of aging and I always felt a little uncomfortable because we had one girl there that was a med-tech that it worked there for years so she knew certain things but she still not a nurse. So luckily you know things have kind of improved a little bit where we did have a video and everybody that pass meds had to review the video and do a testing, even though I would always tell them: if you took a telephone order take it over to the nurse and ask her to transcribe it on the morrow because the unit clerk there would have to enter it in the computer system or I would have to enter it cuz I had access to the computer.

And every month I was responsible for reviewing the physician order sheets the Mars the treatment sheets The Nurses Aide records and printing them out for the next month and for accuracy if anything's changed.

So and then I also did home health and I would go into people's homes and set up their medications course, in the state of Kansas and are and had to set up their plan of care but I would go in and set their meds up if they had wounds. You know if they came home from the hospital and they had sutures or anything like that I would you know do treatments.

I would also set up the home health aide to come and assist the patient in the home here in Arizona there a little bit more flexible regarding IVs and what you can and cannot do in a hospital.

But I am working currently at an assisted living facility and I'm get I'm bridging over to my RN so it's very funny on some some states like California and basically lvns as they call them can work in hospitals but they're very limited on what they can and cannot do. And if they work in a nursing home there just passing meds and doing treatments in assessments and and Reporting it to the RN because in the state of California unless it's assisted living there a lot more strict on what the rules are.

So I did try to get my license in California cuz I was going to move there and they required me to take some more classes they're very -- I guess they require more hours than what my program permitted and they also want you to take HIV and a few other things that when I took LPN school in 1990s. We were talking about HIV but nowadays you know it's more requirements like in Kansas and Missouri.

Kansas requires LPNs to get their CEUs keep that monitored Missouri I wasn't for sure about in Florida I had to keep my CEUs and here in Arizona I know that you have to keep some continuing education class units or classes. So each state is different you know what you can and cannot do.

Some states they don't even have like when I worked in Florida and a skilled facility in a nursing home all I did was passed medications and I did treatments the RN did all the other stuff because they don't really have medication aides in a skilled facility. Now in an assisted living facility was make sure that they reminded the patience to take their medication so I would set up pill boxes for the week and the Medicaid or non-licensed Medicaid wood would remind the patient hey it's time for your for you to take, did you take your pill? Or they would remind them. They could not hand it to them but they could watch them take it in the book.

And then also when it came to insulin or blood sugars in the State of Florida has to be a licensed nurse or a registered nurse. When I worked in Texas medication aides could not do that but when I worked in Kansas medication aides could do blood sugar's. They just could not administer insulin. And the state of Missouri medication aides or medication technicians as they call them our license or certified to give insulin so they have to take a you know our class. And then I would for 2 weeks walk with them and watch them make sure that they knew what they were doing, make sure they were drawing up correctly. But when I was there usually I did it but I'm talking about when I left at 3. If somebody had a blood sugar do it for and insulin do but four meals or after meals and they were responsible of giving it. But I also felt uncomfortable with that.

When I was in Iowa they don't even have medication medication aides so Iowa was real strict on what an LPN or could do regarding if it's skilled care Assisted Living hospital care. They very seldom hire LPNs in hospitals but if you do and I did work at a hospital there there were only certain units we can work on. We couldn't do IVs but we could do admissions head to toe assessment, we can call the doctor; we had to have an r in co sign off on our assessment. If we took a telephone or a verbal order weird to have an RN cosine which is fine.

Once I complete my RN degree I'll have my associate's degree I would like to get into different areas that I've never really been allowed to work in and so I'm finding you know I got one more year of school. It's challenging working and going to school you know why I feel like sometimes I'm running around with the chicken with my head cut off. But Phoenix Arizona where I live at flexible on LPN and we can do pretty much. So if you move here and you get a job in a hospital or nursing home as an LPN you make sure that you know what your practice is scope is