got fired after only worked three and half weeks

I wont sugar coat it..The right side weakness shouldof eben in the patients chart..as for the rest it seems like the precptior you had was not orienting you well enough..did you feel at any time that you were unsure of yourself or your skills? if so did you ever bring these concerns to the charge nursing or your manager. Sound liek there was a break down incommunication between your manager, preceptor and you..also unreasonable expectations from everyone..

Keep your hea dup and toss it up to epereince.. Try sharpingin your skills via and IV course and move forward..all you can do is learn from this exepreince. Not the end of the world..and not entirely your fault..

MOVE ON...Good Luck

ACY

That place seemed to be harsh in you in reality ou don't technically learn iv skill until you start working it is NOT A requirement of nursing school seems like someone is jealous of you and was talking bad about you don't be sad keep your head up thy r suppose to teach you not expect you to be a 40 year experienced nurse

I was tought iv in my BSN program also and I placed 4 ivs successfully in real patients while at clinicals in the Emeregency and on regular units that was something I just was good at surprisingly but still I was jut lucky that doesn't mean they shouldn't teach new nurses

Thanks so much for the comment. As for IV, I had my clinicals at GI center at local hospital so I had inserted about 10. The problem all the patients I had at work were elderly and I never got chance to insert an IV. I did report this to my director.

As for the right side weakness, I know I should have known that. The problem was that when you were orienting, you were with somebody so it was not up to you to look at at the chart and get to know patients before you enter the room. It was not up to me. The nurse I was orienting with told me to start to do assessment and pass meds and I could not say I want to look up patient's charts so I was kinda frustrated.

Also why do I get complaints about my skills from my director instead of the nurses I were orienting with? Some of them were just not nice and I dont know why. I dont know if anyone ****** at me because I was gonna take 18 days off to go oversea with my husband and they felt unfair for me to take that many days off?! I dont know, but yeah, I am starting to apply for new jobs.

also the thing is I cant appy for hospitals in that system anymore:(

Thabks so much ACY for your comment. When I was unsure something, I did ask and told them I was not sure. for the pt had right side weakness, it happened this past monday and the director didnt mention at all when she saw me on wed morning so it was strange.

Moved to the First Year After Nursing Licensure forum

Welcome to the real world of nursing!

I wish all nursing schools will have well equipped practicing labs and enough clinical hours to practice your skills, but in reality -you learn while you work. First years are usually the hardest! Every single day will be a challenge! You need to work extra hours just to review things and practice on your own. You need to be at your work place earlier then anybody else and leave later. Communication is the key and try to explain your concerns to your preceptor. If you will keep silence it is understood that you don't need any help. You can't take care of patients with complicated cases. Ask questions if you unsure how to do things, have reference materials close by to review. It will take time to memorize until it will become automatic.

When patient coughs it is always an alarm, for second time - it is a warning, third time - you got lucky nobody reported you! Thank God patient is well. Try to learn and be very careful! Ask experienced nurses - most of them are willing to share their knowledge. If you are ashamed to ask questions among your workers - find friends on other floors, networking helps too. Read about most common mistakes nurses make. Lawsuits there for a reason. Don't assume information will be given to you - you need to analyze situation and think three miles a head of yourself.

Try to review what types of patients are in your department and what other nurses are doing, some day you will have the same patients. You have this forum where you have nurses from various specialties and backgrounds.

My heart is with you! Even if you will look for new job somewhere else, you can do it! Just be careful!

As far as complaining about the IV thing---I've worked with nurses who just plain couldn't do them, and these were seasoned nurses who were great at everything else! On the flip side of that...it's a skill you have to learn. I got lucky, the first REAL time I had to do them, I just got them, I can easily say that I have placed over 100 IVs.

The choking thing---you couldn't tell in your assessment that he had right sided weakness? What did your assessment consist of? Why couldn't you read the chart? If you are precepting to be able to work on your own, why not say, "Hey, lemme read the chart" or "I'll pass the meds after reviewing the charts"...this isn't school anymore where you can get away with doing what the nurse tells you.

I'm sorry this happened, and in all reality, there should have been more documentation against you instead of flat out firing you. More documentation would have allowed you the chance to realize that you had things to fix. Honestly? I'd file a complaint against the hospital if this is how it really went down.

An employer can let you go for any reason during the probationary period. Most employers have a 90 day probationary period.

i got complaint from one patient as he stated that he was not comfortable with me being in the room. what happened was he aspirated and almost choked three times when i gave him medications because he didnt turn his head to the right side. he has copd and right side weakness so he was supposed to turn his head to his right when he was eating or drinking. i was not aware of that situation(his right side weakness) and i was totally panic as there was nobody with me at that time. i didnt get report from last shift nurse as well so i dont know should myself be responsible for that his being choked accident???

as for narcotic waste, i didnt know if you only give half dose, you are suppose to waste half doses, but after the nurse i was orienting with pointed out, i was doing the right way afterwards. so in summary, i didnt actually make any medication errors so i was assuming she meant potential med errors.

the director also said i am too hyper, not calm enough and the fact was i wasnt nervous with every single patient (she said shes not gonna go from there). she also pointed that i didnt have good iv skills i was supposed to have from learning at school. the point is iv skills staff like that is not gonna be perfect just by learning at school, right? practice makes perfect and now i feel like i am such a loser!!

i am here to hear everybody's thoughts and dont afraid to say harsh things. i like different opinions. thx

if i'm understanding this correctly, you let your patient aspirated three times and didn't follow up further? not once, which would have been enough for me. not twice, which should have been enough for anyone, but three times? then the patient complains, and you think there's a defense? and that the defense might be that you didn't know he had right sided weakness? there are so many problems with this scenario, but the first is that instead of abjectly apologizing and being scared to death that you hurt someone, you're attempting to defend yourself. yes, you're responsible. you're the nurse.

panicking is never the correct response.

how could you not know about narcotic wastes? in every single hospital i've ever worked, part of the hospital wide orientation, before you even get to the floor, narcotic waste is covered in class. even if it wasn't, it should have been covered in school.

panicking is probably a very good reason for the director to say you're too hyper.

my concern isn't that you have poor iv skills or that you didn't read your chart (although you should have, even if you have to come in to work half an hour early to do so before your preceptor arrives). my concern is that trying to defend a whole series of bad decisions and poor judgement instead of worrying about the potential harm to patients (like the one who aspirated three times). and the panicking part is a concern, too.

another big concern is that other posters have jumped on here to tell you to hold your head up high, it's not your fault. everyone makes mistakes; but when you're a nurse, you have to learn from them, not just come up with "reasons" why you should be excused from them.

I do appreciate your comment. This is really helpful. For the aspiration thing, the first time happened I thought he was just drinking water too fast because it did happened to another pt so I didnt really pay attention(I learned my lesson). I asked him do you want to take a break and he said "I will be fine" so I let him try second time (he drank slowly) and coughed. Then he told me he should have turned his head to the right side and he was fine. When you drink sth too fast, dont you sometime cough little bit water out?! However, I do realize that being panic was not very professional. The point was I do not believe being aspirated made him mad at me. It was when he asked for inhalation (THE ORDER was BID) so he could not have it till night time and he was so not happy and then he told me he wanted to talk to the nurse I was orienting with. BTW, I DID apopolize to him and he said he should be the one to apologize for not having telling me in advance. I know I should have known better.

FYI, I did not have narcotic waste during oriention. Here is how my orientation worked: starting at the first day I was on the floor and I followed a nurse and I've had about 9 shifts and each shift I was with a different nurse and all I was doing was just doing assessments, giving meds (some of them will follow me and some of them just let me do things by myself and ask them if I have any questions). I never had any formal classes except glucose testing and documentation. I did ask a lot of questions.

FYI, for the IV, I didnt even to get to do a single one:( so I have no idea how did that poor IV skills judgement come from.

I strongly agree with you with your last paragraph. I am trying to learn from this experience thats why I am posting this. I didnt ask you to judge whether they fired me was right or wrong; instead, I asked for your opinions. I do realize I made bad decisions and I have so many things to learn.