Bad Habits Nurses Develop

luvanurse0630 · Mar 5, 2005

I agree. We use barcodes at the hospital I work for. There is NO WAY of getting around it.

BCMA(BAR CODE MEDICATION ADMINISTRATION) is much easier to work with
than MARS is to work with.
:rotfl: :chuckle

dolphinRN · Mar 5, 2005

throwing dirty linen on the floor...a personal bad habit I've slipped into, and trying to decrease the incidence of...

I actually has one of my nursing instructors do this in front of me when we were working together at the same hospital. I was a NA at the time and still in school.

My last floor assignment was with older Oncology patients who have very poor veins for decent IV sticks. My husband caught me one afternoon when we were at the mall admiring this guy's veins. They were big enough to put a 16 gauge in without a tourniquet. So I guess admiring nice veins on people is one of the bad habits I acquired.:chuckle

mattsmom81 · Mar 5, 2005

there are plenty of nurses (and we all know some) who have not updated their skill set for the past few decades!

was this really necessary? why disdain older nurses in order to build up a student? refer back to my earlier comments regarding the worst bad habit nurses develop. :uhoh3:

MKANS · Mar 5, 2005

School is one thing, real world nursing a whole nuther world. Personally I would like to see more nurses worrying about our OWN practice vs looking so much at OTHER's.
So...IMHO,a bad habit nurses develop is thinking they have a right to overly engage in CRITIQUING each other. Starts in nursing school unfortunately and is likely part of why new grads feel 'eaten' when they turn out.....they 'critique' the wrong person at the wrong moment.....CHOMP.

AMEN!!!!!!!!

MKANS · Mar 5, 2005

[
Checking the obits, I am REALLY bad about this. In fact, it's usually the first section that I turn to when I pick up the local paper every day. Doesn't help that the obits are RIGHT ON THE SECOND PAGE of the paper!
I'm only a student, and I'm already checking the obits. Always had a curiosity before school (who died young, why, etc), but now I look for people I may have come in contact with--esp after my nursing home rotation!!!

To fellow student nurse-I do the exact same thing...glad to know I'm not the only one.

LPN1974, LPN · Mar 5, 2005

Who charts from memory?
steph :)

I USED to....but now I'm starting to need to write V/S and blood sugars down as I take them, or I will forget.

I guess it's a thing called age.

JVanRN · Mar 6, 2005

I USED to....but now I'm starting to need to write V/S and blood sugars down as I take them, or I will forget.
I guess it's a thing called age.

No...I'm 24 and I still have to do that. I was NEVER able to chart from memory. I get sidtracked to easily.

sparkplug · Mar 6, 2005

I do not see anyone not wearing gloves but if I did I would tell them about it and if it continue I would speak to my manager. This is a health risk for everyone and even if you are a student the time to start advocating is now. As for the MAR's and popping the pills prior to getting into the room, I will tell you that I have done this and have had 2 med errors in 30 years. I sometimes take the MAR and lately I have been doing this all the time. The thing is when you are in school you do everything by the book, when you are a staff nurse you learn what you can safely do and what you cannot.

tracytoon · Mar 6, 2005

I can remember when nurses still smoked at their station. (Bad habit)

I recall a nursing instructor saying "As students, you haven't earned the right to cut corners. When you get into the real world and know what you're doing, then you may not be so quick to judge other nursing performances."

I constantly remind myself that no one is perfect. The only time I really concern myself with the nursing habits of someone else is when they are actually creating a life threatening situation for a patient.

Two bad habits I have noticed recently: eating nachos at the med cart and never ever stocking it for the next shift. :)

grimmy, RN · Mar 6, 2005

was this really necessary? why disdain older nurses in order to build up a student? refer back to my earlier comments regarding the worst bad habit nurses develop.

just to be clear, i am an older nurse, and far be it from me to disdain "older" nurses. what i said was the truth...it's too bad that i would be chided for speaking it.

RN4NICU, LPN, LVN · Mar 6, 2005

Would I not give breaths to person who wasn't breathing because I didn't have a protective mask? I'd probably weigh the cost/benefit analysis, for myself and for that person.

The statistics for people who come down with AIDS after having been stuck with a needle which had been used on an AIDS patient is under 1%. So, what is my chance of getting AIDS if I give "unprotected" mouth to mouth on an AIDS patient? Well, let's see--do I have any open sores in my mouth?

I am guessing you have never given someone breaths (or bagged them). I say this because they have a very frequent tendency to vomit. I don't know about you, but I REALLY don't want someone's vomit in my mouth, whether I have open sores in my mouth or not. Gross.

LPNer · Mar 6, 2005

Look here, Toots. I don't call not gloving for a quick cleanup "bad medical care." Either you're not a nurse or you haven't been one for very long.
If you were or had you read anything about the history of nursing and/or infection control in healthcare, you'd learn that it's only been since the "Age of Aids" that we were able to use gloves at all for anything but sterile procedures. We were formerly taught that gloves were too impersonal and their use would offend the patients.
Quite a debate raged about how to use protection without offending the patient. We then went to Universal Precautions. Now it's "Standard" Precautions and offending the patient is not even factored in.
Some people find that horrifying, considering the messes that we have to clean up. It's hard for me to imagine that back then I recall ASKING to use gloves--and being refused because except for sterile gloves, there were NONE in the building!
PS The next thing we touched was the sink to wash our hands.

Couldn't have said that better myself!

Though not in the context of this thread, this also reminds me of years ago if the super heard you refer to a pt as "room 662" she would have wore your ears out on being so impersonal. Now, with HIPPA you are not alolowed to say their name! Talk about turn around. Same as the impersonnal use of gloves. Wearing gloves for personal care, at one time, was the same thing as telling the pt they are gross.

However, now-a-days there's aids, mrsa, cdiff, etc. Wouldn't catch my fingers in it without gloves! However, I do start some IVs and do some finger sticks without, depends on pt cooperation, Dx, etc.