First Clinical Day

Nursing Students General Students

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7:15 am, I meet my very first patient. She's paging the nursing staff so she can get off the john & that is how we meet.

Over the next 2+ hours, we do am care together. I make mistakes in absolutely everything I did. Bedmaking (unoccupied, which was good) was particularly hilarious. Made the bed not at all like I was taught. My patient was hardy, had a good sense of humor and taught me a lot. Messed up the vitals-- bp was off & forgot to chart them until the end.

My preceptor was gentle in her guidance. I need to learn prioritization, time management, & probably a bunch of other things that she decided not to mention. The primary was kind as well.

This is clinical for newbies so it was only 1 patient doing am care for only 2.5 hours. By the end I was confused, dehydrated, had a splitting headache that engulfed the entire left side of my head. I made probably at least 20 different mistakes.

As for my overall impression-- I LOVED EVERY SECOND OF THE EXPERIENCE. I was grinning like a fool the entire time, except when I was apologizing to various people.

I learned an important thing today-- I have sooo much to learn & I am grateful that I made so many mistakes on my first day. Hopefully on my second day, I'll make different mistakes.

Anybody else a grinning fool at clinical?

:D

Caroline

:) I have to smile because I remember my first clinical -- took me at least 2 hours to do a bed bath and linen change...and that was WITH a classmate helping me. Takes me about 10 minutes now. :) You learn....the curve is straight up!

That's awesome you had such a great first day!

I will let you in on a secret, anytime you do something for the first time ie. give an injection, administer your very first meds, flush your first hep lock, you will be grinnin like a fool and forget everything you learned in class.

At least that's how me and my classmates are! We probably look like a pretty funny bunch.:D

The way our program and instructors are, you are best served to make mistakes at first. That way, you show "improvement" over the clinical course. Because unless we show improvement, we do not progress!

So basically, you are well on your way to becoming a nurse.:chuckle

Thats great that you had such a wonderful experience. I have a great one for you. My first client had alzheimers, and when I went to go chart her vitals and ADL's, she walked right up to the nurses station , took a chart, and told me that this patient needs to have surgery right away. Turns out she was a nurse and thought she was actually taking care of patients. I loved it. I then went down to the gift shop and bught a deck of cards, and we played cards all afternoon. Kept her occupied and I learned so much from her.

I also had my first clinical experience today, and after reading PlanetCaroline's experience, it was completely how I felt too...

I couldn't find my patient's radial pulse... he had a good sense of humor about it... totally forgot that I should do the apical pulse... opps... took the BP on the wrong arm (you shouldn't do it with the port... but the pt. insisited... I knew that, but for some reason my anxiety threw judgement out the window). Then I took the apical pulse, but I was so nervous that I messed up my counting... the crazy thing is... I have a degree in engineering too...

Then I tried changing an UNoccupied bed and I felt like I was in a 3-stooges routine the entire time with the fitted sheets... I think it took me 15 minutes! Yikes! My patient and a visitor were sitting chatting in the room while I made the bed and I was so nervous while making a bed, yes, I got one corner on the bed, tried to put the other one on and then the other side came off! They were probably thinking this poor student, she must be really special!

:)

Then I helped out a classmate of mine with a bed bath, and some pooh decided to come out as we were bathing him... and luckily got on a towel, but when I left the room I couldn't help but let out a chuckle... I loved every second. At least in nursing you know when the s%#t is flying!

I can't wait till next week!

Specializes in Peds ER.

Both of your "first clinical day" stories were wonderful...thanks for sharing them.

Specializes in Pediatrics.

I had my first clinical experience a week ago and I fumbled around a lot too! I forgot to take my pt's apical pulse and a bunch of other things. The this week I was on my own (we were allowed to have partners the first week). Actually we were all supposed to have our own patients this week but everyone in my clinical group chickened out and had partners except for me! This week my patient was a retired RN and she just seemed to intimidate me. She was a really smart cookie. Well I went to take her BP and put my steth in the wrong place and she moved it for me...then when I went to take her apical pulse she did it again! It was kind of nice in that way but I felt like I kept goofing up. You know what I mean? Its much different if your patient isn't watching your every move to see if you messed up.

Has anyone noticed a pattern in their patients? Both of mine so far have been ladies in their 60's, both diabetics admitted for foot related issues. Oh yeah, and both headed off for surgery in the PM. No AM care either. My classmate had both of her patients head off to radiology for GI issues, so she feels like she hasn't been able to do much for them.

I definitely feel like I have some time management/organization issues and this week I tried to cover all of my bases...but we'll see when I try to write up this careplan today!

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