Bad Rep for Med Surg

Specialties Med-Surg

Published

Any med surg nurses out there have any ideas or input about why med surg has such a bad reputation and what could possibly be done about it? We see so many new nurses and experienced come and go (before completing orientation). We see new nurses doing everything possible to avoid that "year of med surg." I know there's short staffing woes, but that can only be fixed if we get some good nurses to stay. I know there's the eat your young thing - but isn't the buffet open on all units in some way? Why are we so bad? I love it. I try to show why and what I love about it, but nobody works with me hardly unless they are eagerly watching for the chance to jump ship to another dept! We hear on our floor that we need to learn to work as a team better - I said, that would be easier if the players didn't change so fast.

How do we make med surg less of a nightmare and help nurses choose this field?

As a nurse manager in a med-surg unit I am saying AMEN to all of the above. I find it hard to entice new nurses who are seeking the glory and thrill of ICU and the warm fuzzies of Maternal-child. We do absolutely need to reflect our ratios to give the nurses the time they need to care for their patients. I admently disagree with one post that you do not use your critical thinking. You are using it constantly. You could have anything and everything in one day! I am amazed when we have a ICU nurse who "HAS TO" float down, and is shell shocked at what we do. Sometimes I get the impression they think our patients are not that hard (or we are not that smart), when in reality we have some very sick patients and have to juggle multiple things at once. They are usually ready to run back to their one or two patients.

Med-Surg is a speciality!

Specializes in med/surg.

well ladies i'm a gn and i'm starting on med/surg next week, well actually after a week of classroom training, i'll sart and i'm very excited. i worked on the unit as a cna and though it could be hectic (like one aide for 30 pts) i loved it and i'l be working 3rd shift and i already know the awsome nurses working there @ noc and know them to be an absolute plethora of knowledge and experience and they work together & help each other out whenever humanly possible. i'm pumped, i 'll be making less than some of my fellow gns but i believe i'll get the training and assistance a new grad requires... much more important than the almighty dollar.

Specializes in Medsurg/ICU, Mental Health, Home Health.

my fear about medsurg came from a couple of sources: clinical and my externship.

medsurg clinical was rough. i felt like i was an idiot, that the nurses were always in horrible moods, and all the patients were complete care with 394230832 meds. of course, now i realize that i was not exactly an idiot, that having students around can be really stressful to a nurse who is already stressed, and nursing students are given the more difficult patients for a reason. thus, when it became time for me to put in for my preceptorship, i went to the nicu.

as for my externship, i did perioperative services (pacu/prep & holding, same day/ambulatory surgery), and had walkie-talkie, healthy-as-a-horse patients. the nurses were deeply respected by the surgeons, and everything was pretty routine. i would take care of "medsurg" patients in pacu & then transport them to the floor. i wanted no part of that hell! however, i now work on that very floor because it's the closest i can get to periop with my lack of experience as a nurse. and it's not too bad. really. i wish someone had told me this in nursing school.

i think, had i learned in the didactic portion of nursing school, why medsurg nurses do it, why they've stuck with it, that sort of thing, i might have considered it. also, because i never worked on a floor or even shadowed a nurse on a floor, i knew not the real side. so maybe having a class during which nurses from different specialties talked to the class, answered questions, that sort of thing? and requiring shadowing on a medsurg floor might help. i had a preceptorship in the nicu, shadowing in icus, bmt, or, home health, school nursing, l & d, hospice...but no medsurg!

another point. my friends who were externs on floors often really hated medsurg, but it was usually because they saw the tech side, not the nurse side.

didn't mean to prattle on like that. i guess that's my....2 dollars? :)

*jess*

Specializes in LTC, Sub-Acute, Med-Surg.

I love Med-Surg!! For some reason, we are the dumped on floor, and most critical nurses think that they are a specialty and we are not. I beg to differ. We have to use our nursing skills all day and every day. We don't have monitors to beep when something is wrong. We actually have to go to our patients and do a thorough assessment and then notify the MD and let them know what is going on. We are highly skilled and I wish people would start to give us the credit and respect that we deserve. Yeah the work can be HORRIBLE at times with the pt loads and the type of pts, but we get everything and anything and you learn SOOOO MUCH. If we just had to deal w/ just one organ okay, but how about our pts who are REALLY SICK and have multisystem problems. We keep them alive and get them well just like any other nursing unit. Med-Surg nurses are the best:w00t:

i am a new nurse and i just started on a busy med-surg floor. i find myself perpetually overwhelmed by the pt's acuity levels and the number of patients that i get (typically 6, but has been higher on several occasions). i am constantly running from one room to another, i am lucky if i get 15 minutes of break (management believes that if you schedule your lunch at a specific time and you didn't go, that it is your problem, not theirs). there's really no time to sit down and read the pt's history/chart to get a clear idea of what's going on with your patients, it's also hard to stay on top of all the labs/procedures/new orders. i do my very best to listen to the patient's fears/anxieties/concerns and advocating for them, but most of the time i feel that my patients deserve more. before getting this position, i did my externship on oncology floor and i loved being able to sit down, talk to my patients, get to know them, provide comfort and support. i walked away every day from that oncology floor feeling like a made a difference, i built bonds with my patients, they remembered my name and missed me if they didn't see me for a couple of days. to this day, i remember most of their names and their medical diagnoses! and that was almost a year ago. the patients were more acute than the pts i have right now, but i only had 3 and i had ample time to stay on top of the labs and new orders, i was even present for doctors' rounds every morning so i had a clear idea what the plan of care was. on this floor, i have to look on my sheets to remember the pt's name and medical history. at the end of the day i feel tired and mediocre. i think this floor provides a good learning experience and a solid med-surg background, but i don't think i will be staying past my 1 year commitment.

Med/Surg nursing is hard work. Physically hard and mentally hard at times. Too many patients and not enough staff. Multiple orders and nurses feeling overwhelmed.

In the military, if you don't come in certified in a nursing speciality, you have to do a year of med/surg before they will let you go to a specialty course. I think that this is good because really med/surg is the foundation of nursing.

A brand new nurse should not be given 6 patients right off of orientation. They should be in somewhat of a "protected' status for the first month until they gain confidence in taking more patients. We will usually have a resource nurse available to help this new nurse if the census is low and the resource nurse does not have to take patients.

Specializes in Med/Surg,.

Hi. During my last semester of nursing school I thought I wanted to work ICU. I had worked in the float pool as an aid for three years on the floors and really didn't have a clue where I wanted to work. I interviewed and recieved a position in the ICU at my hospital. About three weeks before I was supposed to start I decided I wasn't ready/ stressed about not knowing anyone down there so I talked to a floor I enjoyed floating to (Med/Surg). I stayed there for a year, it was stressful at times. I also really enjoyed it at times. Towards the end of the year I felt ready for the switch to ICU and thought it would be a lot better because staffing at the time on the floor sucked badly. I been in the ICU for two months and I think I'm getting ready to transfer back to the floor! I have to admitt, my general stress is probably lower in the ICU than on the floor (alot more setting around time) but not nearly as enjoyable as a good day on the floor. Also, I've had a pitful (read: hardly any) orientation to the ICU. :twocents:

Specializes in ER, Renal Dialysis.

Ok, maybe I am late to this discussion.

But hear this: I am thinking of going into Med/Surg. This after two years of ER/Dialysis.

Why? I miss bedside nursing, one that I experienced in nursing school aeons ago. While I knew that the pace, load and stress is huge... I also know the excitement of everyday being a different and interesting one. Gosh, my years in dialysis is so boring, albeit being a highly (and it really is so) specialized field. You got to see same faces every week doing exactly the same thing. Repeat X1000.

And for the record, I should think that Med/Surg should be recognized as a specialty. Even when I was working in ER, I discovered that there is so much that I don't know about a case as I transfer the cases to the ward. Really guys (or girls?!) I see you all with highest respect.

Thinking about this, doing masters in Medical Surgical is not that bad.

Specializes in ICU, Pedi, Education.
As a nurse manager in a med-surg unit I am saying AMEN to all of the above. I find it hard to entice new nurses who are seeking the glory and thrill of ICU and the warm fuzzies of Maternal-child. We do absolutely need to reflect our ratios to give the nurses the time they need to care for their patients. I admently disagree with one post that you do not use your critical thinking. You are using it constantly. You could have anything and everything in one day! I am amazed when we have a ICU nurse who "HAS TO" float down, and is shell shocked at what we do. Sometimes I get the impression they think our patients are not that hard (or we are not that smart), when in reality we have some very sick patients and have to juggle multiple things at once. They are usually ready to run back to their one or two patients.

Med-Surg is a speciality!

As an ICU RN, I have the highest respect for med-surg nurses. I am one of those who is ready to RUN back to my one or two patients because I am completely overwhelmed. Med-surg is an integral nursing specialty and I think anyone who does med-surg is an AWESOME NURSE!!!

I have tremendous respect for med/surg nurses.

Here's an observation. We all have different learning and thinking styles, and it's generally a wise thing to take that into account when deciding where to work. Med/surg is a great specialty for those who like breadth and variety. Your focus is spread wide and there is always something new on the radar. Critical care, by contrast, is more suited to people who prefer depth. The focus is much narrower (fewer patients) and the things that pop up on the radar tend to require you to dig the same spot deeper.

From that standpoint, med/surg was not a good fit for me. I felt scattered when I wanted to concentrate. From what I know about critical care, that would have been a much better match, and if I were just starting my nursing career, that is where I'd head.

Seems like extroverted people who are energized by activity and interaction with others would thrive in med/surg, while hermits like me would be better off in the closer confines of 1:1 or 1:2 care.

I realize these are generalizations, but I think we ignore this aspect of our personal make-up to our detriment and then think something is wrong with us when we find ourselves struggling in an environment that runs counter to our design.

Wouldn't it be nice if somewhere along the way, we were all tested to determine our personality types, learning styles, and other attributes to give us some idea of what we are best suited for? For one thing, it would give us permission to decide if a particular kind of job fits like a glove, fits like a mitten, or fits like mousetrap. Then we could make choices based on our own mental health and inner needs rather than guilt and confusion.

It's probably a pipe dream to hope for this to become a normal part of nursing education, but individuals can gather some of this information on their own. For every square peg trying to jam herself into a round hole, there is a square hole going empty and a round peg looking for a home.

Specializes in ED/trauma.
I have tremendous respect for med/surg nurses.

Here's an observation. We all have different learning and thinking styles, and it's generally a wise thing to take that into account when deciding where to work. Med/surg is a great specialty for those who like breadth and variety. Your focus is spread wide and there is always something new on the radar. Critical care, by contrast, is more suited to people who prefer depth. The focus is much narrower (fewer patients) and the things that pop up on the radar tend to require you to dig the same spot deeper.

From that standpoint, med/surg was not a good fit for me. I felt scattered when I wanted to concentrate. From what I know about critical care, that would have been a much better match, and if I were just starting my nursing career, that is where I'd head.

Seems like extroverted people who are energized by activity and interaction with others would thrive in med/surg, while hermits like me would be better off in the closer confines of 1:1 or 1:2 care.

I realize these are generalizations, but I think we ignore this aspect of our personal make-up to our detriment and then think something is wrong with us when we find ourselves struggling in an environment that runs counter to our design.

Such a great point! I think MANY people don't think about this, esp. new grads, esp. when they post things on here thinking that they're "horrible" nurses or nursing is the wrong fit.

So many people start in med/surg because they assume they have no other choice. But it's such a horrible fit for SO many people. I know med/surg isn't my ultimate home, but I chose to start there specifically because I wanted the broad experience to move on with. (I'd prefer to have too much information and go narrower than have to work backwards and learn more.)

I'm an extroverted introvert. Although I love working with people, at the end of the day, I need to close off from the world. Even on my days off, it's a stretch for me to talk to my friends vs. just texting them!

The best part (for me) about nursing, though, is knowing that I have such a wide range of possibilities. Although m/s is too much for me on some days, I know it's going to give me the experience I need to get where I want eventually.

Seems like extroverted people who are energized by activity and interaction with others would thrive in med/surg, while hermits like me would be better off in the closer confines of 1:1 or 1:2 care.

Hmm; interesting thought.

I've worked on a medical floor, an OB/peds floor, and in a birth center. I will tell you that the ones that worked best for me are the ones that were more stressful. I recently left OB to go back to the medical floor. Everyone was like "No one transfers TO medical, everyone transfers FROM them!" But I missed the energy and the challenge, and I think my sense of humor is definitely best suited for night shift on the medical floor.

I'm an extrovert.

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