Do you have advice for med students on your floor...

[Ginger's Person]

My roommate started his 3rd year med school clinicals earlier this month, on a general medical floor. He's working hard and is trying to do a good job, but he knows he has a lot to learn. As nurses, what advice would you give to a med student doing clinicals in your unit?

What are some habits practiced by med students who have impressed you or you have enjoyed having around?

What have you seen med students do that worries or annoys you?

I know he'll appreciate any good advice!

[classicdame, MSN, EdD]

Touch your patient. I am amazed how many MD's do not get within 3 feet of a patient. They treat the lab reports, not the patient.

[rachelgeorgina]

Touch your patient. I am amazed how many MD's do not get within 3 feet of a patient. They treat the lab reports, not the patient.

My great auntie was in hospital for about a month just recently with cardiac problems. For a while, it was looking pretty grim, including a three day stay in ICU before returning to CCU. Every day when I went in to visit her, I asked if she'd seen the doctors. She's not confused in anyway. She'd reply with, "oh yes, I've seen them." & I'd say, "well, what did they say" Her reply? "No idea. They don't talk to me. They stand at the end of the bed and talk about me to each other!"

[Sterren, BSN, RN]

If you write orders, give the chart to the secretary or put it on the correct shelf or in the correct bin (and if you don't know where new orders go, ask) so that those orders are made known to everybody else who is taking care of the patient. If you choose to instead write orders and then leave the chart in a cubbyhole at the end of the hall, do not even think about yelling at the nurse when those orders weren't noticed 3 hours later. If you haven't bothered to talk to me, and let me know you were in the room while I was with my other patient, and then you haven't bothered to let me know that you want to change something in the plan of care, and then you haven't bothered to put those new orders in a place where someone else might actually be made aware of their existence, then guess whose fault it is that those orders were never completed? That's right, yours. Not mine.