I'm a new nurse working my very first job at a LTC facility. One of my patients has a prn narcotic and a prn anti-anxiety med. The orders say prn q4h as needed for pain and PRN q4h as needed for anxiety.
I may be wrong, being that i'm new and all but to me this means that the patient can get the drugs every 4 hours as needed, no sooner than that. I medicated the patient at 11:00 so the next dose was due at 3. This patient comes about every 4 hours like clock work because he " needs" these meds, so he approached me at 2:00 for his prn's and I told him he wasn't due until 3 pm so the nurse on the next shift would give him his next dose.
When the next nurse came in he got nasty with me asking why didn't I give the patient his meds when he asked at 2 . I told him that it wasn't time, 4 hrs were not up yet. This nurse then tells me that we have an hour before and an hour after to give meds so I should've just gave them to him at 2. I said to him that I think that just applies to regularly scheduled meds, not PRN's and I was not going to give are sign for any prn's early, certainly not narcotics. He continued to argue the issue with me and tell me I was wrong so I just left. Now he has me second guessing myself. What is the proper procedure for PRN meds?