Question for trauma icu nurses

Specialties Critical

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What does your day consist of on average tasks wise? I am considering this field in health care but of course I have my worries of the unkown so if someone could please reply :)

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Specializes in SICU, trauma, neuro.

Are you a pre-nursing or nursing student, or are you an RN already?

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Pre-nursing

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Specializes in critical care, trauma, neurosurgery..

The average day for a trauma ICU nurse is not much different than that of any ICU nurse. Get report, assess the pt, give meds, turn, pt care,turn, assess, turn,give meds, assess and turn haha. Most people think that icu nursing, and especially trauma ICU nursing is always high octane, adrenaline filled, all the time, but most days you will find can be very routine, and those are the days you will appreciate after having a high octane, adrenaline filled day. In the trauma ICU, you can expect to have pts with many IV lines, chest tubes, tons of fluid resuscitation, and having to manage any other co morbidities they may have. You more than likely will have pts with frequent neuro checks, spinal precautions, and even Ventrics if they have severe head injuries. Trauma ICU nursing is great, and its definitely a speciality, but at the same time, you must be a jack of all trades, because trauma can affect pts of all ages, and often just complicates any health problems the pt had before the injury.

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Specializes in Surgery, Trauma, Medicine, Neuro ICU.

Assess, turn, medicate, turn, chart, assess, turn, medicate, (eat????) turn, bathe, assess, turn, scramble, chart, turn.

Somewhere in there are trachs, pegs, level 1 infusers, codes, poop, blood, drama, traction, labs, care rounds, labs, meds, daily wake up, codes, chest tubes, emergent "fill in the blank here".

it's my favorite!!

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Nothing better than enjoying and loving your career even though there are hard times

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Specializes in SICU, trauma, neuro.
Nothing better than enjoying and loving your career even though there are hard times
Love what you do, and you'll never work a day in your life. (Or something to that effect.) :up:

It's hard to boil everything down to a typical day of tasks. When you get into nursing school you'll learn about the nursing process which involves assessment, planning, implementing the plan, and evaluating it. In this case, you'll apply that to the care of the critically injured, to the pt's many complex needs. You'll be involved with nursing interventions and collaboratively with medical interventions. What I'm saying will make more sense once you've learned about it and have a chance to practice in clinicals.

That said, I'll try my best to describe the highlights.

*Hemodynamic support: maintaining adequate BP and correct amount of circulating volume, perfusion to the brain, etc. This is done w/ blood transfusions, IV fluids, meds.

*Correcting abnormal labs: supplements, electrolyte binders, restriction of plain water in the case of low sodium levels, dialysis, blood products.

*Pain managment

*Promote pulmonary function: monitor the pt for the effectiveness of their ventilator settings or other supplemental O2, get them into the chair a couple times a day if they're stable enough, turn every 2 hrs (so long as they are allowed to move), clean their mouth very well every 2 hrs to prevent ventilator-associated pneumonia

*managing sedation: not too much, not too little

*managing many many gadgets: cardiac monitor, ventilator, central line or pulmonary artery catheter, EVD for draining CSF and monitoring ICP (you can google those...I'm too lazy to type the words), cooling devices, Licox for brain temp and oxygenation, cardiac output monitor

*Transport. Whenever the ICU pt has to leave the unit for testing, the RN must go with (whereas in other parts of the hospital, the CNA or transport person can take them).

*Protecting the skin. Turning pt if s/he is allowed to move, keeping him/her clean and dry, keeping bed linens smooth, using pillows under bony areas, recognizing need for specialty mattresses

*Helping the family understand what's going on, and helping them cope. Some other specialties, they've begun their journey before the hospitalization; for example, a cancer diagnosis. With trauma, it happens in an instant. A couple kisses goodbye in the morning, and one of them gets hit head-on on the way to work.

That's a start to what we do. :yes:

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I'm working in Benghazi, Libya as Trauma ICU Nurse and most of our cases here are road traffic accidents (RTA), history of fall, gunshot wound, blast injury, stab wound and a little of burned cases. It's an awesome experience and I got to learn new stuff everyday. I can say it's a task-oriented job but working with dynamic people can be fun at the same time. As a Trauma ICU nurse, your job responsibilities are the following:

-Assessment of the patient, get blood investigations, follow up request of chest x-rays, ultrasound, and CT-scans, transport pt. to CT-scans and x-rays, give medications and IVF, assists in chest tube insertion, stitching of wound and central venous line, managing sedation via syringe pump, suctioning of secretions, turning pt., giving ngt feeding, blood transfusions, pain managements, cleaning the patient, changing bed linens and diapers, ecg, tractions and most importantly documentation.

traumasurgRN is right. It can be very routine in the long run but it's still a challenging job. I started working May of last year, so based on my level of experience I'm just an advanced beginner. ;)

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It all sounds like something I would love to do and would work extremely hard for to always do my best for co workers, patients and myself. However I feel like I am not smart enough to go to the next step. Right now I am a national certified medical assistant, national certified phlebotomy technician and nurses aide in Ohio and just transferred that to PA. Even though I can obtain those is becoming an RN something I can do?

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I know how it feels helpinghands93. I've been there to that phase of life. My advice is just keep on going, don't settle and just keep yourself pushing. Strive for being the best of what you can be. I'm positive, you will be an RN. You know, one of the reason why I joined here is because I want to fortify my nursing skills just by reading and absorbing the information in this website. In addition, I want to be fluent in English just by conversing with all the nurses here. I'm hoping after I finish my contract here, I'll be able to apply in Canada or England. :)

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I wish you the best of luck m_88_mago :) thanks for the encouragment. I love this community app. Everyone has their own experience and life lessons and its awesome to share and help others as much as possible and even a "you can do it" goes a long way.

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Your welcome helpinghands93. I wish you the best of luck too. :cat:

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