I graduate from nursing school in may and I had my last clinical in the ER from 11a-11p saturday night. The day was busy and I was getting great experience putting IV's..like 30 in one shift, more than all of nursing school! Anyway, around 7 pm a guy in cardiac arrest was brought in, I got to do CPR!!! I was so nervous and shaky! But I did it. Unfortunately the man did not make it. I was okay, it was sad but I handled it well I thought. Well I got in my car at 11pm and it suddenly hit me that this guy died totally unexpected the day before easter. His family was so sad.
I love the ER and will work there eventually. Does anyone remember their first CPR experience or patient death??
I am tech in an ER whiel I'm in NS. 1st code I ever saw was a little girl (pre-school age) who had drowned at the swimming pool. Ripped out the hearts of EVERY person in that ER that day, including the doctor. We had to pull it together for the family and the rest of our patients but each took their turn in our chapel crying that day with one another. I felt like such an idiot because it was like watching a car wreck, I didn't know what to do for the poor girl (not to mention, whole team of people in our cardiac room, was a bit full), so I just held dad's hand while he cried and watched.
We also had another patient with a whole list of chronic problems and death was knocking on his door. When we got him, he was very sick. Family refused to even consider a DNR and he was still alert enough to refuse it as well. Coded about an hour later while we were waiting on a bed at another facility to take him. With that death the hardest part was the family and their grief over what we did to their dad and how they wished he had a DNR so he could've just gone in peace. No matter what we could've/should've told them about a code, I don't think they had any idea what it was going to entail with their dad.
mom2michael, MSN, RN, NP
1,168 Posts
I am tech in an ER whiel I'm in NS. 1st code I ever saw was a little girl (pre-school age) who had drowned at the swimming pool. Ripped out the hearts of EVERY person in that ER that day, including the doctor. We had to pull it together for the family and the rest of our patients but each took their turn in our chapel crying that day with one another. I felt like such an idiot because it was like watching a car wreck, I didn't know what to do for the poor girl (not to mention, whole team of people in our cardiac room, was a bit full), so I just held dad's hand while he cried and watched.
We also had another patient with a whole list of chronic problems and death was knocking on his door. When we got him, he was very sick. Family refused to even consider a DNR and he was still alert enough to refuse it as well. Coded about an hour later while we were waiting on a bed at another facility to take him. With that death the hardest part was the family and their grief over what we did to their dad and how they wished he had a DNR so he could've just gone in peace. No matter what we could've/should've told them about a code, I don't think they had any idea what it was going to entail with their dad.