Most Common Patient Diagnoses

[beauty912]

Hello Everyone,

I'm a recent grad looking to go into med/surg nursing. I would like to know which conditions or illnesses seem to be the most common on a general med/surg unit. I ask because I'd like to know what to expect to see frequently, and I'd also like to also brush up on these conditions in my books so that I could at the very least have some in depth knowledge about them. I know that diabetes and CAD are two biggies from clinical experience. Any others?? Thank you all in advance. I would really appreciate any feedback. ?

[MNRN2009]

OhBoy123 said:

Abdominal pain- of unknown etiology.

My absolute favorite....also known as "narcotic deficiency".

[dankimal]

In my neck of the woods we get a ton and a half of cocci pneumonia.

[graceomalleyRN, RN]

carluvscats said:

I work on a straight medical floor, so the only post-surg pts we get are ones who have had less invasive procedures ~ I&D's, scopes, biopsies, that kind of thing. But I'll answer you the best I can. We get a lot of pneumonia, COPD, sepsis, UTI, any "unexplained" pain or suspected infection, cellulitis, detox pts, renal failure, falls, dehydration...diabetes as you said. Many are isolation pts ~ MRSA/VRE/c-diff with an occasional TB as well. Some of the older folks have heart histories, of course, so they are on telemetry sometimes.

Hope this helps. Good luck to you in your future career! ?

My medical floor sounds EXACTLY like yours, carluvscats (love your name!) Our floor excludes tele patients though until our new hospital is built, at which point all medical floors/nurses will be tele trained.