Had my first real emergency today

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Specializes in Nursing Instructor.

OK so here it goes... I work rehab ... we don't see a whole lot of real emergencies... so my aide comes to me and says I need you in 201... I go in the room and the pt is diaphoretic and the aide said I can't hear a BP... sure enough, I listen and I cannot get one either. He is audibly gurgling with every resp so the first thing I do is call respiratory... then I call my charge nurse and she comes down... says yep and walks out of the room. Resp gets there and the man sats at 66 on 3L. She bumps him up to 6 and calls for the suction equipment. On 6L he sats at 67 and his pulse was thready and 157 bpm. Meanwhile I am checking him over... pinpoint fixed pupils, systolic of 50 lethargic but still yelling whenever we move him ( MS and stage 4's all over) We managed to get him out of our facility and to the ER in a matter of 20 minutes.

I always thought I would panic the first time something like this happened. I was SO full of adrenaline that it was like I didn't even think about what I had to do, I just did it. I am still kind of pumped and it happened at 9 am!

After it was all said and done I went to my charge nurse and said OK what could I have done differently or better.... and her response was that next time, I don't need to call her... I need to trust my own instincts!! I took that as a HUGE compliment.

Anyway...sorry it was so long... I was just so excited (only a nurse would find this exciting, hubby didn't get it lol) I wanted to share!

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Specializes in Peds Cardiology,Peds Neuro,Pedi ER,PICU, IV Jedi.

Congratulations!! The best thing you can do for any patients in an emergency situation is to keep your wits about ya...and it sounds as if you did that just great!! And you'll never go wrong by notifying those in charge..they need to know. The rest is as easy as ABC...

Again - great job!!!!

John

OK so here it goes... I work rehab ... we don't see a whole lot of real emergencies... so my aide comes to me and says I need you in 201... I go in the room and the pt is diaphoretic and the aide said I can't hear a BP... sure enough, I listen and I cannot get one either. He is audibly gurgling with every resp so the first thing I do is call respiratory... then I call my charge nurse and she comes down... says yep and walks out of the room. Resp gets there and the man sats at 66 on 3L. She bumps him up to 6 and calls for the suction equipment. On 6L he sats at 67 and his pulse was thready and 157 bpm. Meanwhile I am checking him over... pinpoint fixed pupils, systolic of 50 lethargic but still yelling whenever we move him ( MS and stage 4's all over) We managed to get him out of our facility and to the ER in a matter of 20 minutes.

I always thought I would panic the first time something like this happened. I was SO full of adrenaline that it was like I didn't even think about what I had to do, I just did it. I am still kind of pumped and it happened at 9 am!

After it was all said and done I went to my charge nurse and said OK what could I have done differently or better.... and her response was that next time, I don't need to call her... I need to trust my own instincts!! I took that as a HUGE compliment.

Anyway...sorry it was so long... I was just so excited (only a nurse would find this exciting, hubby didn't get it lol) I wanted to share!

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Well done!

Yeah, that adrenaline is amazing stuff.

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