We've all got them. Those things we find that just get us riled. Perhaps reviewing them will help newer nurses. Perhaps writing about them will just let us vent.
Here's mine:
OGTs that aren't in far enough. The OGT may be in and secured where it has been but the baby has grown. Nurses check placement: push in a little air, hear the sound over the gastric area, aspirate and find no aspirate. They also don't get the air they pushed in back but since they heard the air they think the tubes ok when in reality its just above the sphincter in the esophagus. Put the tube down another 1/2 to 1cm and then you get back the air, and possibly a large amount of residual that was being missed before. If you don't get the air you pushed in back, you have to ask why not!
Have we mentioned nurses who try to make others feel dumb in report? Drives me nuts. We have a new nurse who is struggling and some people are so mean to her, really yanks my chain.
Have we mentioned nurses who try to make others feel dumb in report? Drives me nuts. We have a new nurse who is struggling and some people are so mean to her, really yanks my chain.
AMEN!!!!
We actually just had a staff meeting about this issue. Mutual respect. It's not even limited to new nurses. I get a new one ripped all the time, and I'm relatively experienced
Babies left laying on skin probes from the previous shift
Unneeded amount of blankets in the bed that are serving no purpose
When people don't understand the concept that the medication tubing holds 1mL and they run a 1mL in over the prescribed rate (so it has now filled the tubing) and then run a flush over 5 minutes (which then pushes all the med in 5 min)
Knocking on the incubator when a baby is apneic or desatting.
When people don't understand the concept that the medication tubing holds 1mL and they run a 1mL in over the prescribed rate (so it has now filled the tubing) and then run a flush over 5 minutes (which then pushes all the med in 5 min)
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I am SO with you! Our unit actually changed our policy about running flushes... they have to run at the same rate as the med. Problem solved :)
Specializes in Neonatal nursing (paediatric trained).
My biggest pet peeve is toaster heads...
That's one of mine. I hate, hate, HATE it when I scrounge all around the unit looking for a developmental piece of something or other, like a "peanut" so the kid will actually have a back to his/her head, and I come in on the next shift and it's been taken out of the bed/incubator or put in the laundry! Another young, newly qualified nurse and I seem to have this ongoing battle with whomever it is deciding these babies don't need anything to support their position. :angryfire
Babies left laying on skin probes from the previous shift
Unneeded amount of blankets in the bed that are serving no purpose
When people don't understand the concept that the medication tubing holds 1mL and they run a 1mL in over the prescribed rate (so it has now filled the tubing) and then run a flush over 5 minutes (which then pushes all the med in 5 min)
Knocking on the incubator when a baby is apneic or desatting.
I'm guilty of messy drawers. I don't make an extra mess, but if the drawer is messy when I get there and I don't have time to clean it then I don't.
The unneeded blankets are an infection risk in an isolette and a sids risk in a crib, that is crazy.
We run flushes at the same rate as the med, although our med tubing only holds 0.3 ml.
I have never seen anyone knock on an isolette for an apneic baby, if we have to stim them, we touch them.
I have never seen anyone knock on an isolette for an apneic baby, if we have to stim them, we touch them.
Nobody should be knocking, tapping, or writing on the isoletts. There is nothing to absorb the sound. The decible level is high and can cause hearing damage.
ocds nicu nurses with too many "pet peeves"!!! because i realize i don't work in a one nurse unit, i know diffrent people have diffrent ways of doing things. i also know that anyone who went to nursing school more that 15 years ago was taught to be very task oriented, even thought we all know better now some of it has stuck. have you ever gone to a nursing home and seen old nurses in their wc washing their hands over and over again or trying to take their surounding peers vs and a real tale-tell sign is constantly folding invisble linnen? let it go folks or it could be you!!
This is one of many, but my latest personal favorite...
I guess one nurse must get really bored I come on and find that babies leads have been braided (!!!) together. So if that one annoying one loses it's stick, you have to pull all of them off, or spend precious time unbraiding them.
Or, they equally elaborately drape the cables in knitted fashion around the equipment. Again, fine when you work a shift when parents don't come in to hold, not so good for tryin to get baby out whilst still connected to monitors. Oops, there go those annoying braided leads again.
AMEN to this one!
Imafloat, BSN, RN
1 Article; 1,289 Posts
Have we mentioned nurses who try to make others feel dumb in report? Drives me nuts. We have a new nurse who is struggling and some people are so mean to her, really yanks my chain.