Interruptions while giving report

[MsSocalRN]

Hello everyone, I was wondering if I could get some opinions on a pet peeve of mine. I hate when the nurse coming on interrupts me while I am giving report to them, would it be unprofessional of me to say please let me finish my report and then if you have questions I will answer them. I report head to toe and I will be on the neuro part and they will interrupt me and ask what kind of fluids they are on!!!! Drives me nuts. I am a fairly new nurse, I have a little over a year experience but I am new at this hospital only about a month and I don't want to make people mad, but I don't want to be ran over either. Please give me some ideas on how to handle this problem.

[MinnieMomRN]

I think it's a reflection of experience. I have noticed that newer nurses tend to recite every little detail. Perhaps because they are still sifting out in their own minds the pertinent info from the less pertinent info. I think they don't want to miss anything, so they give you EVERYTHING in report. It's kinda like a show-up and throw-up of information :) The more experienced nurses tend to just give you the bullet -- which I prefer, but I do try to be patient with the newer nurses. I try to keep in mind what it was like to be a newbie. I think as they grow in comfort, the report gets more succinct. Least that's my humble opinion...

[DixieRedHead, ASN, RN]

For me personally, I don't need to know if they peed, or how many times they peed. I only really need to know if they DIDN'T pee. But that's just me.

[SHURN]

I agree with amarilla - we give report in our ICU like she described. Very detailed. Still, being that detailed I can give report on both of my patients in 10-12 minutes. Considering we can't clock out until 23 min after, that's fine. We are also required to go over all orders from the last two shifts and go over am labs and tests together. 5-6 min per patient is not very long for a sick ICU patient. However, there are some nurses that seriously want to talk about everything. It would take 45 minutes sometimes!! I have learned to just say, "that's ok, I have enough! I'll figure anything out in the next 12 hrs! SMILE" I try to be nice about it, but I'm sure they realize I am annoyed.

I also hate people interrupting me. I just say, "sorry, I get sidetracked too easily and don't want to forget anything." I have most definitely resorted to "if you let me finish, I'll tell you that in a sec." Not recommended.