Hello everyone so after covid hit, everything transitioned online, including clinicals. I am going to graduate this December but I have a huge problem.
I HAVE NO HOSPITAL EXPERIENCE!!
The only clinical I went to was at nursing home where we didn't do much besides feeding the residents and taking vital signs. We did not get to pass any medication, look at documentation, etc. I have never done or observed any basic nursing skills such as administering IV, documenting, passing a med, IV push, foley, assessments, etc.
I feel like I know nothing and will be fired from my first job because I am completely clueless. What do I do ?
Nursing schools are notorious for abdicating their clinical teaching responsibilities to the staff nurses.
I do take exception to this statement as that has not been my experience in my 45 years of providing clinical education. I have however worked for schools that prided themselves on the clinical skills graduates acquired. I have taught in the full gamut of nursing education : diploma, associate degree and BSN
I do take exception to this statement as that has not been my experience in my 45 years of providing clinical education. I have however worked for schools that prided themselves on the clinical skills graduates acquired. I have taught in the full gamut of nursing education : diploma, associate degree and BSN
That may be your experience but there are many here who have experienced otherwise including myself and my colleagues.
I am not sure why your response sounds insulted. We all know and agree that this shouldn’t be the state of schooling. I am not doubting that there are going to be hardships due to that inadequate schooling. I’m simply stating that these are circumstances out of any of our control so we have no choice but to figure out how to navigate among them.
Plenty of our aides are in nursing school and they would desperately prefer hospital clinicals to hours of case studies. I empathize with them and the fact they all started nursing school expecting a typical experience and were dealt this difficult year.
I don’t know exactly why hospitals shut their doors to students. I would guess the liability of more people potentially getting sick, and the need to conserve the PPE we have. But it’s of no fault of the nursing students, that is who I am trying to be supportive of (the OP).
My area in particular is facing a severe nursing shortage which is of course compounded even more now by the pandemic. We desperately need these new nurses, even if we have to some how find the extra time to help them learn.
I will apologize if I misread your tone. It sounded to me like you were trying to make some kind of superior distinction between your own feelings and the feelings of those who have posted along the lines that this really isn't okay. While I don't have the attitude of "everything'll be okay, just tell them you need more training," I am very much in support of new nurses; I'm confident that my posting history would support that.
7 hours ago, NurseLy said:
Plenty of our aides are in nursing school and they would desperately prefer hospital clinicals to hours of case studies. I empathize with them and the fact they all started nursing school expecting a typical experience and were dealt this difficult year.
I'm pretty sure most of us empathize with people who want to be in clinicals and are unable to due to reasons out of their control.
9 hours ago, NurseLy said:
Everyone who is speaking like this should never happen... lots of things in 2020 should never happen. I should not be trying to remote teach second grade yet here we are. Circumstances are not ideal, but no one can change that that is the reality of nursing school right now.
Remote teaching of second grade is not a similar example in that you aren't preparing people to go out and be legally responsible for others' health and well-being in a very harsh and unforgiving environment. A big part of my point is that the nature of nurses' responsibilities should mean that someone has begun to think outside the box by now--the future employers/clinical sites and the educational institutions. It isn't okay that nurses' education is viewed as some practically optional thing. We already mostly teach ourselves the book material. Perhaps you can't see it but trust me when I say that the attitudes related to this do not represent regard and respect for the idea that nursing is a specialized profession where proper training matters.
7 hours ago, NurseLy said:
I don’t know exactly why hospitals shut their doors to students. I would guess the liability of more people potentially getting sick, and the need to conserve the PPE we have. But it’s of no fault of the nursing students, that is who I am trying to be supportive of (the OP).
I get that those are all reasons, I'm just not sure how good they are in December 2020 as opposed to March 2020.
It has already been stipulated that clearly this is not the fault of nursing students, of whom we are all trying to be supportive. The nursing students who aren't getting the training are the ones who are losing out on a significant part of a nursing foundation. Once they are on payroll somewhere, people (employers) are going to be way, way more concerned about these undertrained nurses carrying out their responsibilities than spending a lot of time being dependent and needing to basically finish nursing school on hospitals' dime.
7 hours ago, NurseLy said:
My area in particular is facing a severe nursing shortage which is of course compounded even more now by the pandemic. We desperately need these new nurses, even if we have to some how find the extra time to help them learn.
I would be interested in hearing about what sorts of additional trainings and educational opportunities employers have come up with now that students are coming out with no clinical experience.
I do take exception to this statement as that has not been my experience in my 45 years of providing clinical education. I have however worked for schools that prided themselves on the clinical skills graduates acquired. I have taught in the full gamut of nursing education : diploma, associate degree and BSN
It has most definitely become a problem. There is no doubt about it. I would guess that you are not accustomed to dropping your students off on the floor to be paired with staff nurses who will facilitate their education for the day while you sit in some obscure area doing your grad school homework or grading care plans.
There is no doubt about it. I would guess that you are not accustomed to dropping your students off on the floor to be paired with staff nurses who will facilitate their education for the day while you sit in some obscure area doing your grad school homework or grading care plans.
At the end of the day, some posters on here are mentioning 0 clinical experience, either received in school or viewing the nurse on the floor who got exactly that. We are 12 months into the pandemic, these people were in nursing school longer than that...so what was going on the other year plus of clinicals? And to suggest Youtube videos as a replacement when those may or may not be correct procedure, is insane. Patients already complain about care, this is opening the floodgates. And the schools will continue to collect tuition for their wonderful top notch programs...
@Wuzzie, I was thinking of that too, but I've seen worse IRL. Like dumping the students off, then showing up to check on them, which consisted of walking into a Code where the student was observing, yapping loudly while others were trying to concentrate, being too dumb to know what was going on and therefore thinking a staff nurse made a mistake, going to admin to report "mistake" and ultimately being asked not to return to department even if your students are there. ??♀️
3 minutes ago, Hoosier_RN said:
Patients already complain about care, this is opening the floodgates.
Even worse than that is the way these poor individuals will be treated by employers. They will be spited, mark my words.
@Wuzzie, I was thinking of that too, but I've seen worse IRL. Like dumping the students off, then showing up to check on them, which consisted of walking into a Code where the student was observing, yapping loudly while others were trying to concentrate, being too dumb to know what was going on and therefore thinking a staff nurse made a mistake, going to admin to report "mistake" and ultimately being asked not to return to department even if your students are there. ??♀️
Even worse than that is the way these poor individuals will be treated by employers. They will be spited, mark my words.
That's what I was getting at in a round about way. They will be blamed for everything
And I have a huge problem with this. 50% is too much.
It is extremely difficult to obtain clinical floor hours. When I first started teaching in the hospital (for a diploma program) the hospital was able to have a census of 800 patients. Of course that was almost 35 years ago. Gone are the days of total hips and knees staying a week or more. Actually there was no significant 'outpatient' surgery program. At one time even cataract surgery patients stayed a couple of days.
Since we have made such advances as same day surgery, alternative therapies of care and the significant development of a home care nurse, census is now about half. For example I broke my hip and stayed 2 days post-op with daily home visits of OT, PT and RNs.
I have a ratio of 1:10 students and am present in the unit for the full clinical time. The faculty limited off-unit activities to at most 2 over 16 weeks, When a student spent a day in the OR. it freed me up 1/10th of the time.
Our city colleges provides nursing clinical education for 5 programs with 2 hospitals. Of course we have added clinicals on Saturday and Sunday as those days are not popular with all the other programs. Negotiations with each hospital coordinator(s) of student experiences and a representative(s) from each school are pretty stressful meetings. The magnet hospital wants the BSN students, and the other hospital has its own BSN program. All graduates from the 5 programs have steller records of post-graduation employment.
It just isn't as easy as it sounds to cry "more clinical time".
Even worse than that is the way these poor individuals will be treated by employers.
I also think they will have a great deal of difficulty with their peers. Nobody has time to hand-hold and the staff's frustration is going to start showing. They need to get them back in actual clinical (if med students are allowed so should nursing students be) or delay graduation without charging them additional tuition. This is just bad all around for the students and I feel for them.
It just isn't as easy as it sounds to cry "more clinical time".
I really don't appreciate your contempt.
27 minutes ago, londonflo said:
I have a ratio of 1:10 students and am present in the unit for the full clinical time. The faculty limited off-unit activities to at most 2 over 16 weeks, When a student spent a day in the OR. it freed me up 1/10th of the time.
As mentioned before, this is not the norm and you can fault the for-profit nursing schools for this.
londonflo
3,002 Posts
I do take exception to this statement as that has not been my experience in my 45 years of providing clinical education. I have however worked for schools that prided themselves on the clinical skills graduates acquired. I have taught in the full gamut of nursing education : diploma, associate degree and BSN