How should I respond?

[I'mANurse!]

I'm a new grad starting in the NICU and I'm afraid that parents are going to ask me a ton of questions that I don't know the answers to. What is the best way to respond to these questions without making them feel that I am not competent to be thier child's nurse? It also doesn't help that I look like I could still be in high school!

[suanna]

You are a highly educated health care professional. Most questions you are going to get are from laymen with little or no medical background. Most of the time there is a simple answer and a long technical answer- most people will do better with the easy one. My best advise is keep your ears open. Even though you may know most of the answers to the day-to-day questions, some of the more seasoned nurses have developed answers and ways of phrasing the answer that are clearer for the patients families to understand and accept. The last thing you want to do is increase thier stress. I had one nurse who tried to explain metabolic acidosis to the family of a patient. They went home and immidiately called the hospital administration, the attending doc (at home) and all the rest of thier family with the complaint that we had somehow put a lot of acid into thier loved ones blood and it was killing them!!! Always remember KEEP IT SIMPLE!, and expect to be missunderstood.

[mawjood]

:)all the one menition is the questions but sometime if baby really sick you can told them i really advice you to speak to docs