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Discussion

First Mistake!

I made my first mistake (that I know of) after 1 year and 1 day of nursing!! I got report from the day shift nurse on a patient back from OR that afternoon. He had an epidural...in a PCA (my first clue). He did not have a button (for demand dose)hooked up and the nurse told me that he was just getting a basal dose. I SHOULD HAVE LOOKED!!! HOW STUPID OF ME! This morning the docs came in and discovered he did not have his button. They were more than a little upset (understandably). I was asking the patient's pain level every hour (this is ICU) and he was never out of control and if he was having unacceptable pain, I gave him IV morphine, which helped. I did talk to the patient and asked if he had been lying there in agony all night, and he said no. I feel awful about this!! I hope hope hope the pt was not in agony!! I know I am going to have trouble sleeping today!! I have never worked with an epidural, so never thought twice about not having a paper to sign off on...which is dumb cause there was fentanyl in the epidural! Oh and the cherry on top is the doc of this patient is the devil. So, I have made the devil mad...it figures. I just want to cry!:crying2: :chair:

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Just seeing how upset you are about this, I can tell that you are a good nurse. We are all human and mistakes will happen. Don't beat yourself up about it. Even the Devil Doc is not infallable!

Just take a deep breath. I can feel how torn u are about this incident. When we make mistakes the most important thing is to learn from them. I can tell that you will never make this mistake again. This incident will help to make u a better nurse than u already are. :)

A nurse friend of mine once said to me she stopped counting after the 12th incident report she had to fill out because of a mistake. and she's the best nurse i know. the thing is we need to accept that mistakes will be made and not beat ourselves up over them. i think it's just as important what you do after the mistake is made as it is how 'clean' your record is. you took all the right steps after you realised what you'd missed. you took responsiblity and spoke to the patient. congratulate yourself on what you have done (and all the millions of 'right actions' you've accomplished in the past year). You sound like a good nurse to me!

  • Experts

Please try to remember all of the good work you have accomplished during the past year and do not allow this one example of your human frailty to take too much of your energy. Your energy is better spent in getting back to your usual good level of care. Your patients are expecting the usual good you! (And that means reasonably happy, not morose or worried.) Remember all of us here at allnurses still like ya! ;)

I just read your post. I am a new nurse as well- on my own for two months. I think that you should look at the fact that you went a year and a month without a mistake. Any experienced nurse would tell you that that is a record to be proud of. Honestly, nobody was injured by your mistake and you will always check the orders on epidurals now. I hope that I get through my first year and month without any mistakes!

Keri

When you come in to discover a piece of equipment that you're not familiar with, grab your charge nurse and ask her to look it over with you. It's always better to ask!

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