BRAINS!!!

I'm gonna tell you that the "Please be nice when responding" made me much LESS willing to do the research into brain sheets for you. It's rather insulting to have someone assume that they have to direct posters to "be nice."

A poster named Esme has several brain sheets that are downloadable. I believe that if you do a search for her, you will find some. I could have done the search and posted links for you, but . . . .

Another idea is to ask the nurses you work with what they use for brain sheets. Everyone has their own idea of the best brain sheet, but if you take someone else's, you can adapt it for your own use. In general, I used name, room number, admitting physician, diagnosis and gender (sometimes not so obvious from the name). I jotted down the times I'd be giving medications, treatments, drawing labs, etc. I made note of anything I needed to look up. In the beginning, I had to look up just about everything, so my brain sheet took up half a piece of typing paper. As I learned, I could fit 4-5 patients on a piece of paper. Alternatively, you can keep an index card for each patient or carry a pocket notebook and use a page.

As I went through the day, I'd jot down anything I needed to remember to chart or mention in report. I took report in pencil, wrote in pen what I learned and/or needed to pass on throughout the day. A colleague has a complicated system where she uses four colors of ink.

Wow, I sincerely apologize for offending you. I have asked for help before in other forums and there are some people who tend to leave rude comments, snide remarks, actually, your reply has a few in them, hence the "please be nice" comment. You were a new nurse at one point in time, which is what I meant. Currently I am in a LTCF which is less than hospitable, you can tell that they don't want our class there, they are rude, snide, hateful, and complain about any and everything that they can find to complain about it, even though we are a HUGE help to them. So I am truly sorry that my post offended you. Thank you for all the great info that your provided. I truly appreciate it.

Thank you!

If I offend anyone else with my "please by nice" request, I am truly sorry. Nothing malicious was meant by it, I have just posted questions in other forums and have gotten some nasty comments in response. Thank you and I hope that anyone reading this thread has a wonderful Thanksgiving!

If I offend anyone else with my "please by nice" request, I am truly sorry. Nothing malicious was meant by it, I have just posted questions in other forums and have gotten some nasty comments in response. Thank you and I hope that anyone reading this thread has a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Usually, the "please be nice request" precedes a series of nasty posts by the original poster being snarky to anyone whose answers she doesn't like. When you ask a question on an internet forum, you often get answers you don't like. When they get an answer they don't like, the "Please be nice folks" will then attack the person who gave them that answer. To question the reading comprehension, intelligence and good will of someone who bothered to try to answer your question -- it rubs a good many of the long time posters the wrong way. And those are the people most likely to be ABLE to answer your question. Your thread hasn't gone that way, and I apologize for my assumption that it would.

You won't know this because you're new here, but RubyVee and Esme are two of The Most willing to give students help. RubyVee will stop to help anybody. There've been times over the years when I disagreed with her opinions but she has never lashed out in a hateful way without being truly provoked. So I have to laugh when you criticize her comments when she just gave you FOUR ways of organizing your brain sheet, and you told her she was being snide.

Wow, I sincerely apologize for offending you. I have asked for help before in other forums and there are some people who tend to leave rude comments, snide remarks, actually, your reply has a few in them, hence the "please be nice" comment. You were a new nurse at one point in time, which is what I meant. Currently I am in a LTCF which is less than hospitable, you can tell that they don't want our class there, they are rude, snide, hateful, and complain about any and everything that they can find to complain about it, even though we are a HUGE help to them. So I am truly sorry that my post offended you. Thank you for all the great info that your provided. I truly appreciate it.

If you truly want to avoid less than nice and supportive responses please give up on the idea that you are a HUGE help to the staff where you are orienting. Trust me, you're not. What you are able to do as a student is in no way a huge help to me, in fact it's quite the opposite. When you have questions about your assigned patient where do you turn? Probable that residents nurse. When you need to find supplies who do you ask? Probably the nurse. Not to mention even though you are working with a resident or two it is still that residents nurse that is ultimately responsible for their care. As that nurse I have to spend so much time double checking what you can and can't do, what you did or didn't do that it takes more time than if I had just done it myself.

I am not saying students aren't welcome. I understand we all start at the beginning and you have a lot to learn, but please don't assume that your clinical experience is in any way helpful to the staff nurses.

If you truly want to avoid less than nice and supportive responses please give up on the idea that you are a HUGE help to the staff where you are orienting. Trust me, you're not. What you are able to do as a student is in no way a huge help to me, in fact it's quite the opposite. When you have questions about your assigned patient where do you turn? Probable that residents nurse. When you need to find supplies who do you ask? Probably the nurse. Not to mention even though you are working with a resident or two it is still that residents nurse that is ultimately responsible for their care. As that nurse I have to spend so much time double checking what you can and can't do, what you did or didn't do that it takes more time than if I had just done it myself.

I am not saying students aren't welcome. I understand we all start at the beginning and you have a lot to learn, but please don't assume that your clinical experience is in any way helpful to the staff nurses.

I meant to address the portion of the post that you highlighted, but got distracted and didn't get back to it.

Complaining that the nurses at your clinical site are "rude, snide, hateful and complain about anything and everything they can find to complain about even though we are a HUGE help to them" makes one question the validity of the student's observations. And it's rude besides. SOME of your attitude about them is coming across loud and clear, and it could be the reasons you're having so much difficulty getting along with the nursing staff at your clinical site.

Please dispense with the notion that you and your classmates are in ANY way a help to the nurses. You are increasing their workload exponentially. Not only do they now have seven patients to look after, but they also have to watch one or more students closely to make sure that they don't do anything they're not supposed to do, follow up to make sure they DID do what they said they were allowed to do and would do, make sure the task was done correctly and then that the charting was done correctly and they are usually asked to "entertain" a student as well. As in "Got anything cool going on? Let Susie watch." Staff nurses may sometimes be nice and TELL you that you're being a huge help, but unless the circumstances are extraordinary, you are not a huge -- or any kind of a -- help. You are one more burden for an already overburdened nurse, and that could explain why they aren't all happy to see you.

I've worked with students for many years, and I love to teach. However only one student ever managed to be of help to me. It was the student who stood at the bedside and stripped chest tubes for seven hours until we got the coagulopathy under control and the guy stopped bleeding. Her efforts were absolutely responsible for that man not having to go back to surgery.

Unless nurses really LOVE to teach -- and that isn't what they're actually hired to do -- they don't usually get happy about having a student nurse. You're in their way, you're slowing them down and you're making more work for them. Clinicals are very important in your educations, and most of the senior nurses know that. Most of us are willing to help, even if not thrilled about the extra work you make. But the students we like are the students who are appreciative of our time and our efforts to teach them and NOT the student who thinks she's been a huge help to us.