Looking for a pick me up:/

[kclpn2013]

I'm brand New to this site and I joined because I had something happen at work and now I am questioning my entire being as a nurse. I've had my first job as a nurse a little over a year now. Work has been crazy and one of my residents slipped thru the cracks and has not received the care that should've been given. I would never intentionally neglect someone but it looks that way and is staring me in the face. I'm now questioning my entire dream of nursing and wondering if I should give up. Other nurses tell me its normal to mess up, but I feel horrible. Do any of you other nurses have a situation that you didn't handle the proper way as a newer nurse? I really need some feedback to get thru this. I feel like, yes I know I care more than words can say, but caring isn't enough. What if I lack the skill to safely care for people? Thank you for your input.

[MoopleRN]

The fact that you care speaks volumes even though you haven't been specific at all re the "something happen at work". Was harm done to the patient? Skills that nurses need to safely care for their patients/residents are honed with experience and determination to stay on top of current evidence based practices as well as asking for help/clarification when you need to from more experienced colleagues. Nursing is stressful for the newbies and the oldies. It's hard to buck you up without further input on what brought all this on for you!

[uRNmyway, ASN, RN]

Well, if something was missed at work, you are not solely responsible for it, unless you are the only nurse on staff. Other nurses have also missed whatever care was supposed to be done.

From your post, I gather that you work in LTC. I might be wrong, but that is what it sounds like. This seems to be a common problem with LTC. So many patients, so little time and staff, and unfortunately the patients are the ones who end up suffering for it.

[olddragger]

Don't let it get you down. Nurses are human too and mistakes will happen. Just learn from it and don't do it again.

30 years ago I remember something I did. I was a new RN in a busy E.R. i was just reporting to work and I had not even been given any type of report. The Dr grabbed me and told me to give Ms Smith IM Pcn G in the GYN room. You guessed it ..I gave it to the wrong patient. It was Ms Smith in the GYN room, but there was another MS Smith in another temporary GYN room!

Luckily no harm was done. The pt I gave the med too did have a UTI that pcnG would treat and she wasn't allergic to PCN. The Dr said I cured the hell out of that UTI!

I gave myself so much grief that no one else ever said anything to me. They knew that I knew I had messed up and it would NOT happen again---and it didn't.

So learn from it and continue on.

[kclpn2013]

Thank you I appreciate the feedback. To give a little more info, we lost some nursing stuff so I was running around crazy. We had an outside nurse helping out who didn't do the follow up that was needed for skin break down. But then again neither did I, I should have followed up but I didn't realize how fast something could get out of control. The person is extremely debilitated and on hospice so I know some break down is inevitable....but nursing process and interventions were not followed so if you look at him and his chart he looks neglected. I feel like I lacked the time, knowledge and experience to give him the care he needed and its just hitting me really hard cuz I would never intentionally neglect someone. Nursing is my life and I hate learning from things at the expense of a vulnerable adult:/

[nurseprnRN, BSN, RN]

As a new grad I was the one that gave an IV push antihypertensive to an alert postop patient at the in-person, verbal direction of the chief of surgery in what he described as an emergent situation. The lady's BP went down, oh yeah...and down, and down, and down, and she went to sleep and stroked and never woke up. The surgeon then denied having given the order and laid it all on the first-year resident. He and I were both devastated.

I learned never to give anything again without looking it up if I didn't know it eight ways to Sunday, and to feel comfortable handing a syringe to the physician if he blusters about it. But that woman still shows up in my dreams sometimes, forty years later.

We do learn, if we care to.

[monkeybug]

The fact that you are agonizing over this speaks volumes. Everyone makes mistakes, the key is to do your best and learn from them. When I was new I made up my own system to make sure I had everything covered. I never left until I'd gone down my own private checklist and could assure myself that I'd probably covered it all that shift. And I'd still go home and lie in the bed going over everthing in my mind. And I can still remember, vividly, some of the mistakes I made. But you learn, and you get better, and you try your best. It's the nurses that don't worry and second guess that scare me!