Is there something I'm doing wrong? How to grow

[tuxedopenguino]

Hello everyone, I guess I'm considered an 'old, new grad' at this point? I was let go after orientation from my first hospital job and I've been working on a subacute rehab floor in a nursing home for the past month now after a couple of months unemployment. I'm on the night shift (11-7), and it's a lot of paperwork--chart checks, admission and d/c paperwork, appointments, monthly recaps. Overall I enjoy it. Because of the slower pace at the nights, I felt like I've had more time to ask questions and learn new things. I've grown fond of my residents, and am starting to feel more comfortable giving report. I've been making mistakes (Thankfully nothing harmful) and learning from them, trying to do better every shift. People have commented that I'm handling it well, and that I seem very relaxed for a new grad. I think because I was so incredible anxious during my first job, something kind of cliqued in me that being anxious just doesn't help. So I try to keep it calm. Although the change and pace of the setting is probably the major reason.

However, I just can't help but feel...restless? worried? Probably because i'm a new grad, I haven't been getting any of the more complicated patients on my side, and can't help but feel bored with the routine sometimes...this worries me because I wonder if I'm getting ahead of myself and am not doing as good as a job as I could be. I feel worried about not knowing what I don't know. I'm also not so fond of all the paperwork. It's good practice for practicing my attention to detail though. It's almost like investigation work sometimes which can be fun.

I guess overall I'm enjoying it, but am wondering how I can grow as a nurse in this position? I'm worried about bothering my coworkers too much by asking too many questions and I'm also worried if I am getting too ahead of myself and am wondering if I need to just do the work for now and just take it as it comes? I do want to get acute experience eventually because I feel like it would be valuable experience to have and would like to see where I would like to go from there. I also think wounds can be interesting but I don't really get to do any treatments on nights for the most part.

Sorry for the long post...Any advice?

[TrivaNurse]

Hey! I'm a night nurse at a LTC facility as well. :) This is my first nursing job and I've been there for about 5 months.

I completely understand the worried/restless feeling. I felt like I quickly got the hang of basic tasks (foley caths, passing meds, paper work, etc) so after the first 3 months I also felt kind of bored. Something I found that really helps is writing down my patient's diagnosis and then studying them after work. Obviously, we learned about the common diagnosis already in school but going over the material again when you have real life experience is TOTALLY different. Once I started doing this it really made the nights a lot more interesting because I would know way more about what to monitor/assess/look for. Doing that extra studying has been a huge help in garnering respect from family members and older staff members too because it shows them this baby nurse knows her stuff, haha.

Hope this helps! :)

[tuxedopenguino]

Hey TrivaNurse,

thanks for your response! It's good to know I'm not just being weird having that restless feeling haha.

That's some good advice! I've been trying to do that but have had problems with sleeping in too much...but I've been forcing myself this week to get up earlier and try to maintain a life other than sleep/work/sleep/work...so I'll definitely be making time to study.

Actually, I was asked to do overtime following my night shift because there was a mistake in the scheduling...and I did the day shift's morning med pass on my own for the first time--I was a disaster. I feel like an idiot for agreeing to help out like that. Day shift med pass is a different beast when it comes to time management and I really didn't enjoy pill pushing madness of it all. Especially when I'm unfamiliar with the meds and the names of the meds in the MAR don't match the names in the med cart, dosages are different, some meds are not even there, pain medication requests, family members coming up to me to ask questions about a residents medications, residents with bowel issues, bed alarms going off.....I honestly almost lost my mind. Dangerous situation and very bad decision on my part.

Thanks again for your response! It was really helpful. :) I actually appreciate nights more than before now after doing that am med pass because I do feel like we have that little extra time to actually assess our patients and do play a very important role in preventing any med errors on the other shifts.

[gainschool4lpn]

Hey there- I am a brand new LPN and just started orientation this week for LTC position. I start precepting on Monday and am scared to death! I don't see how the patients can get the care they need if I will be passing meds the entire time!!