The first year as a new nurse is really difficult. My suggestions would be:
Try to stay organized at work (prioritize in the order of importance, pain meds for patient A is more important to get before filling patient B's water jug)
Keeping pt's safe is always your first priority, if your patients are safe everything else will get done at some point
Don't be too hard on yourself, you will make mistakes or make a doctor or your manager mad at some point in time but it's ok, you are learning
Slow down, you can't do everything at once, you are not going to know every bit of information all the time
Take a good report from your previous nurse, taking good notes and writing down key information will keep you up to speed, make sure your notes are organized, use a highlighter to help out
Remember, you are only one person, you can only do one thing at a time
Good luck! You will survive your first year, it just takes some time
Oh yeah, and make friends w/ your nursing assistants, they can make or break your day, they will be your right hand and help them whenever you can because they will return the favor x 10!!!
cn2007rn
232 Posts
The first year as a new nurse is really difficult. My suggestions would be:
Try to stay organized at work (prioritize in the order of importance, pain meds for patient A is more important to get before filling patient B's water jug)
Keeping pt's safe is always your first priority, if your patients are safe everything else will get done at some point
Don't be too hard on yourself, you will make mistakes or make a doctor or your manager mad at some point in time but it's ok, you are learning
Slow down, you can't do everything at once, you are not going to know every bit of information all the time
Take a good report from your previous nurse, taking good notes and writing down key information will keep you up to speed, make sure your notes are organized, use a highlighter to help out
Remember, you are only one person, you can only do one thing at a time
Good luck! You will survive your first year, it just takes some time
Oh yeah, and make friends w/ your nursing assistants, they can make or break your day, they will be your right hand and help them whenever you can because they will return the favor x 10!!!