Do you really remember half the stuff from nursing school?

Nurses General Nursing

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I'm taking pre-reqs right now. My Nutrition class is the worst because there are so many side effects (toxicity/deficiency) of vitamins, minerals, or other nutrients and all these numbers about suggested intake and chemical reactions and ... *breathes* just so many details. I take the exams online so that I can cheat and use my notes- I'm sorry but I have to! There is no way I can memorize a hundred different details in such a short amount of time, especially when they are overlapping details (A is true for 1, and both A and B are true for 2. But for 3 only A is true.)

It seems this way with most medical/scientific things like pharmacology and the proper diagnoses of illnesses: rather than straightforward details, it's a bunch of overlapping symptoms and rules and numbers.

Ramble ramble ramble. My point is... I know I have to learn and memorize something while I'm here. I should have some recall when I attend school to learn something. But am I really going to be expected to run off exact lists of all symptoms of a drug or all signs of a disease at the drop of a hat? Do you guys recall all the medical info you need to treat your patients like it is second nature? Surely you guys get to look things up and make sure you got the details correct, right? You aren't expected to be a walking reference book... are you?

I would hope the answer is "of course not," but my dad was a nurse and is now a P.A and he really is a walking reference book. He knows all the numbers and details off the top of his head... sorry but if that's what it's like working in the medical field forget it!

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Specializes in ICU, Telemetry.

So, if you don't learn all this stuff and you cheat to get your grades, what are you going to do when you've got a patient with an INR > 7 and a dose of coumadin due? What if you see a patient about to eat a grapefruit from home and you've just given them procardia? Tegretol? Amiodarone? Is that bad or not?

If you manage to skate through your classes and clinicals and luck out on the board questions, people will notice when you hit the real world. And then do you want to be standing in a code because you gave someone a med they should have never received because you cheated your way thru your class? If you're asking if this is for you and you're still in pre-reqs, take a break and go think about what you really want to give 100% to in your life, because it doesn't sound like this is really what you want to do. Life's too short to do something you don't have your heart in.

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Specializes in Med/Tele.

Once your in nursing school you won't be able to cheat on the computer. You not only have to memorize the drugs and everything else but actually learn it. I hope you change your study skills before you start!

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Specializes in medical surgical.

If you think that NS is hard, try NP school. I am turning gray quickly!!!!

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You're right, I never want to put a patient's life in danger! Ever! :( Maybe my brain just isn't cut out to retain this kind of info. May I just say though... I want to learn the material, I'm not "cheating" (use the term loosely) because I'm lazy. Lol. This morning I was lectured on 20 pgs of notes with contradictory and info with lots of numbers to remember. I must finish an exam over this tonight. I have one day to memorize it all. Hence, I use my notes because I want that A! I go back over it later and try to really learn it. But summer classes demand you learn it perfectly in a day. I'm sorry but I need to refer back to my notes..... which is "cheating." My question was essentially, do nurses get to use "notes" in their profession? Surely you don't remember every detail perfectly every time... =\

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You can cheat in nursing school, and Ive seen a lot of people do it, but dont forget you have a state board exam you have to pass, and the same people I knew who cheated are the ones who didnt pass, and are now paying hundreads of dollars for classes like hurst and kaplan and other materials to catch up. So do people cheat in nursing school, YES. Does it help you in the long run, NO WAY. And do you have to know the material, YES, but will you remember it all, of course not. Try your best.

Reading your post it seems you want to be in the field because your father is, and he obviously have a good income. You are the first person Ive ever said this to, but maybe this feild is not for you. Rethink things over and do something you would like. I know nurses who went to school because of the money and now hate their jobs, Im sorry but I cant live like that.

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After the first two posts, I thought I would give you some good news. I think that what ends up happening is that you learn the basics in nursing school and you learn the really important things. The most learning you will do is on the job.

As far as being a walking encyclopedia, you will be-in the area that you work in. Sure, there are book and resources that you will need to refer to especially in the beginning, but eventually you will not need to look everything up because you will know it and sound like a walking encyclopedia too.

There are things that I know that I know that I know. And there are things that people should not ask me because I would just give them a blank stare. Such as OB. I am not familiar with the drugs they give laboring mothers. I mean, I know them by name as drugs used during the laboring process, but I couldn't tell you the side effects of them or when they should be given or any specifics of them. And then there are meds that I give routinely in my specialty that I could tell you more than you ever wanted to know about them! And maybe there are some OB nurses that wouldn't know much about them.

As for your testing, I don't think we have enough information to make a judgement. You say you are taking pre-reqs for nursing. If you are 18 years old and this is your first college course, maybe you are still adjusting from high school and need to learn how to study for college level exams. Maybe you are just not a good test taker (that's me!) but if someone casually asked you about the same thing, you might be surprised at what you have actually retained. And, yes, a lot of the stuff overlaps. I found that pharmacology and nutrition both made more sense when combined with the anatomoy and physiology class because then you see how the body systems come together and how nutrition and medication affects the systems.

And you say that you are taking the exams online. Does that mean you are taking the entire class online? I know when I took some classes online they were designed so that you could use your notes. Also, some online classes could be hard because you are doing the research and studying on your own as opposed to someone actually explaining it to you. Maybe you would be better off taking classes in a classroom. People all learn in different ways and you have to learn what works best for you.

In the event that you just can't cut it as a nurse because you can't retain information or that you just don't get it, I think that you will find out soon enough. The people who can't cut it in class usually don't last very long into the program. If that ends up being the case with you, well, you tried. Move on to something that you ARE good at if nursing is not it. Don't waste time, energy, effort, and emotion on something that you don't love doing.

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If theres something you are not sure of as a nurse you always look it up, theres reference books at the nusing station, you can also look it up on the internet. So yes you can use help if you arent sure of something. And please do look things up if its new to you.

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Specializes in L&D.

It's just a nutrition class. =/ I don't think it's a big deal if you use your book as a reference to take a test online. It won't be that way in nursing school, though, which I'm sure you know already. Don't worry about it.

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Just to answer one of the above questions, its a distance learning on campus class with actual assignments completed online with the warning that you not use your notes as this is cheating (silly). I'm 20 and have been aimlessly attending college(s) since 17.

:p

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Specializes in Pediatric/Adolescent, Med-Surg.

While you probably won't use nutrition in quite so much detail as a nurse, you might be surprised how often I do find my self providing nutritional teaching or referring back to my nutrition class. I have worked inpatient endocrinology and spent so much time trying to educate new/non-compliant diabetics on a proper diabetic diet. Also, post-ops might seem easy, but again, you spend so much time during discharge instructing them about a "soft diet, low/high residue, etc." While not every pt in the hospital is seen by a dietician, every pt is seen by a nurse, so you have more influence on basic nutritional teaching for most pts than a dietician will.

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Specializes in Cardiovascular, ER.

Well, I thought online classes allowed you to use your notes, they just make the tests much harder so you would not have time to look every question up. Maybe I am wrong.

As for remembering everything, I don't. I remember basic concepts, but there are many things I refresh myself on. I worked cardiology for a while, so I am good with a lot of things in that area, but now that I am ER, I have to look up most pediatric things, and ob/gyn when I get those pt's. No shame in that, in my opinion. I would rather have my nurse look things up than guess.

Remembering back to my pre-req's I felt overwhelmed in nutrition class, it is a lot to remember, and that is taken in the beginning, before you have anything to apply those concepts to. So, if it helps, I felt the same way you did OP - and as a nurse, it is perfectly acceptable to use your resources to look up new things as you go along.

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