what exactly is med/surg

[roso614]

the other day my professor told me that i should be a med/surg nurse. but the thing is im not completely sure what that means. im only in my first semester in nursing school

[ashleyisawesome, BSN, RN]

that is a "normal floor". it is probably the kind of floor you are on for clinical right now. nurses usually have 5-6 patients at a time. these patients are sick enough to be admitted and monitored but not critical. they may be awaiting or recovering from a surgery. there are some different kinds of med surg floors: general medical problems, ortho, oncology, cardiac, surgical, etc.

hope that helps. :)

[FutureOBNurse2118]

On a med/surg floor, you'll be seeing alot of postoperative patients which would be the "surg" part and with the "med" part, think along the lines of pneumonia, copd exacerbations, kidney failure, pancreatitis exacerbation, etc... just any medical condition that a person might have that requires hospitalization but does not require critical nursing care as you would see in the ICU... Some hospitals have surgical floors and medical floors that are separate and some hospitals have floors that are a combination of both which you would probably see in a smaller hospital.

[ImThatGuy, BSN, RN]

It's the generic patients. It's kind of like nursing's version of internal medicine.

[khotso mayelane]

i think he meant that you should be a competent nurse in med and surg department and be able to know and mamage the conditions and at the same time knowing the nursing care to be rendered