injuries and clinicals...

[sashamay]

Hi =)

Im 24yrs old and am pretty accident prone due to a genetic condition i have (ehlers danlos syndrome.. basically my collegen is defective and my ligaments/tendons are too stretchy and i tend to sprain/twist things a lot and my joints sublux at times (partially come out of place). I have been a CNA for 4 yrs and i know with working i can manage, partly due to sick days and only working 2-3 days a wk.

however..

i'm in nursing school now. 2nd quarter is starting in a few hours. clinicals start in 2 weeks. i'm presently in a wrist brace (somehow sprained my wrist 2 and 1/2 weeks ago on break) and 6 days ago my ankle decided to tweak out somehow (i have no clue whats wrong with it, but im limping fairly bad..and have intense pain half the time bearing weight).

I havnt talked to anyone at the school about my condition b/c i dont want to make a deal about it. I want to just be okay and continue on. i dont like to draw attn to myself and i tend to play down my injuries when i have em (few times a yr i hurt *something* and have for as long as i can remember. normal for me).

any advice for what to do? how to handle it? i'm going to walk into lab tomorrow with my brace and limping... do i just play it down sayin i stubbed my toe? i dont want them to think i can't handle myself. i KNOW i can handle the work...most of the time. but this every day thing...thats what has me worried.

hell i wouldnt be able to use crutches even if i thought itd help the next 2 wks cuz of my wrist... i just dont know how to broach it with the instructors.. any advice would be great!!

[Daytonite, BSN, RN]

Saying you're accident prone and laughing about it sounds pretty good to me. You can only say what you want. No one is going to beat the truth out of you. I worked with someone who came into work with bruises and injuries all the time. Everyone was sure her husband was beating her up, but she never said a word and no one asked her about the injuries. Only a moron would hound someone about how they got injured. There are no officials that they can make a report to. It's not like Children's Services where we are mandated to report. Say nothing or as much as you want to reveal. Personally, I'd say just what I said back at my first sentence, I was accident prone, laugh about it and if people want to talk about it give a run down of other ways you have sustained injuries and talk about the black cloud that follows you around. Under no circumstances would I ever reveal to anyone that I had Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. Keep that between God, your doctor, lawyer or any priest you want to confess that to.

Why you would feel the need to confess anything to peers is beyond me. Loose lips sink ships comes to mind. Foregive me for thinking like an administrator but that's what I did for many of my last years of work. If you answered you had no pre-existing medical conditions on your pre-admission health questionnaire for nursing school, revealing to anyone at this time that you have Ehlers-Danlos syndrome would put you in a potentially serious situation with school officials of having lied and gives them the proof they need to boot you out of their program if they want to. It's easy for them to brush off and ignore silly gossip like "she's accident prone". Specific gossip information like "she has Ehlers-Danlos syndrome" causes red flags to go up and will probably be investigated.

For those who aren't familiar with EDS, here are some weblinks:

• http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/condition=ehlersdanlossyndrome
  
• http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ehlersdanlossyndrome.html
  
• http://www.medicinenet.com/ehlers-danlos_syndrome/article.htm
  
• http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/ehlers-danlos-syndrome/DS00706
  
• http://www.ednf.org/ - Ehlers-Danlos National Foundation