horror stories...

shannymar · Sep 26, 2005

sorry if you've covered this topic already, i'm a newbie to all nurses. soo, let me know!!! :behindpc:

Shannon

markjrn · Sep 26, 2005

Personally, I don't want to re-hash that stuff. Once was enough.

shannymar · Sep 26, 2005

Personally, I don't want to re-hash that stuff. Once was enough.

:chuckle ...That bad huh?

markjrn · Sep 26, 2005

:chuckle ...That bad huh?

Yep, it was. :stone

allele, LPN · Sep 26, 2005

Personally, I just can't remember any real horror stories, nothing above and beyond the normal. As far as gross, I think I'm finally immune to "gross"! LOL!!

As far as hours, I work 12 hour days and LOVE it!! I did do one double last week, but it's quite unusual for me. I actually did one regular shift, one double and one off shift :rolleyes: Weird week for me! Some nurses have been doing a double here and there because it's summer and people have been on vacation, but overtime is not mandatory where I work, if our own staff hadn't covered it we would have gotten floats or agency.

I work in a 350 bed hospital. My floor gets really good ratios, with 3:1 on days, 4:1 on evenings and 5:1 on nights. Evenings and nights can flex up one more if acuity allows it, but days stays pretty much on 3:1. I work on a cardiothoracic surgical floor, by the way. We also get anyone who's had surgery and needs cardiac monitoring.

If I come up with anything weird or horrific, I'll come back! :)

allele, LPN · Sep 26, 2005

Well, I found a couple of links to nursing horror stories, but I'm not one to dwell on the negative, really. So there are also a couple of links to much nicer nursing stories! I'm sure you're only asking about horror stories out of curiosity, but please balance it out with nursing success stories! I didn't spend much time on the search, but I'm sure you can find much more on both topics. Happy reading!

https://allnurses.com/forums/showthread.php?t=120468&highlight=nursing+horror+stories

https://allnurses.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20151&highlight=nursing+horror+stories

And here are the happier threads:

https://allnurses.com/forums/showthread.php?t=73346&page=1&pp=10

https://allnurses.com/forums/showthread.php?t=105604&page=1&pp=10&highlight=happy+nurses

https://allnurses.com/forums/showthread.php?t=120583&page=1&pp=10&highlight=love+nursing

Drysolong · Sep 26, 2005

personally, i just can't remember any real horror stories, nothing above and beyond the normal. as far as gross, i think i'm finally immune to "gross"! lol!!
as far as hours, i work 12 hour days and love it!! i did do one double last week, but it's quite unusual for me. i actually did one regular shift, one double and one off shift ]
question: if your regular shift is 12 hours, does a double mean 24 hours straight?

allele, LPN · Sep 26, 2005

question: if your regular shift is 12 hours, does a double mean 24 hours straight?

egads!! no!! lol! i'm sorry, i should have been more specific......i worked a 16 hour shift, only four hours more than my regular shift, so not too bad for me!! my legs are just killing me at the end, so i don't do it often. sorry again! :)

BabyRN2Be · Sep 26, 2005

And if you're in to the paranormal, there's a thread in here about ghost stories related to nursing! That's pretty fascinating, too.

Drysolong · Sep 27, 2005

question: if your regular shift is 12 hours, does a double mean 24 hours straight?

egads!! no!! lol! i'm sorry, i should have been more specific......i worked a 16 hour shift, only four hours more than my regular shift, so not too bad for me!! my legs are just killing me at the end, so i don't do it often. sorry again! :)

thanks for the clarification!!

Avie · Sep 27, 2005

I work on a Plastics and Reconstructive surgery ward where the shifts are normally 8 hours each excluding the night shift which is 11 hours. We average 37.5 hours weekly excluding any overtime.

The ward is 34-bedded and divided into a male and female side, it's an old-fashioned open ward with only four side-rooms between the two sides which we usually reserve for MRSA-infected patients.

Normally there will be two staff nurses and one HCA to each of the two sides giving a ratio of 10 patients to each staff nurse.

One day I was allocated the usual 10 beds of the female side. The caseload included a TRAM-flap breast reconstruction who required hourly TPR, sats, urines and flap obs, an ear reconstruction on the same obs who required additional monitoring of a marcaine infusion and changing of surgical drains every 10-15 minutes, two bilateral breast reductions one of whom was bleeding into the drains rapidly and the other vomiting profusely and to top it all off we then got an emergency admission who had a gushing arterial bleed from a partially-severed hand.

That shift was a nightmare and a half. The staff nurse of the male side of the ward was forced to abandon her own ten patients in order to help me with mine as we tried desperately to do all the obs and prep the emergency for theatre. At one point the SHO was doing the flap obs.

Luckily all the patients survived but it was a close-run thing.