New Nurse Horror Stories

Nurses Safety

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I am wondering if any new nurses have had horror stories on a new job. I worked one 8 hour shift at a nursing home, It was horrible. I called the DON the next day and said I worked my first shift the night before and it would be my last. I then called the companies compliance hotline and the state.

Here are just a few things my "trainer did or told me"

1) If we don't have a med for the patient we just initial we gave it because we don't want the state to know we don't have it.:eek:

2) A patients 5 pm meds and 9 pm meds were given at 11 pm :no:

3)Meds from the day shift were not charted as given and I was told the day nurse would get caught up with her charting the next day:down:

4) If you realize later you forgot to give a med - just chart as refused :argue:

5) A patient fell and they put him back into bed and said he did it all the time so they don't do any reports.:crying2:

6) Gloves not worn to do accu check or give insulin - and don't wash your hands too much because they will become chapped. Hand sanitizer not available for use:smackingf

7) Several times - if a patients med was not available, the took another patients med to give. She also broke a postassium 20 mEq with her hands that was one patients to give to another patient that was ordered 10 mEq.:grn:

8) One patient was not to receive a dose of meds that day but was to get it the next day. The next days dose was already marked as given. I was told the nurse that gave that dose would see it the next day and skip it.:angryfire

9) Patient ordered Vit D 1000 IU and Vit D2 50000 IU. In the drawer was Vit S 1000 IU and Vit D 1.25 mg. I was told the Vit D 1.25 mg rounded to Vit D2 and since it was in the patients drawer it was his and thats what we give.:cry:

I was then told that this was real world nursing and I better get used to it (I was actually told to take off my rose colored sunglasses).:cool: I went home and threw up. I pray I hear about a hospital job I interviewed for last week!!! I will never do their type of nursing.:banghead:

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Specializes in Med/Surg.

Baking Nurse,

(((hugs))) to you, but KUDOs as well!!! I have been where you are and it is not an easy place to be.

I took my "dream" job, but it turned out to be a nightmare:

*Nurses ordering medications without calling MD (not standing orders!)

*Nurses writing discharge orders, and no call to MD

*UAPs giving discharge instructions

*writing Telephone orders for verbal orders

I had a frank discussion with the manager and told her that I would not be putting my license or integrety on the line for this position. She had no clue that this was happening. She wants me to come back at some point, after things are squared away.

We'll see:(

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Good choice.

Please don't think all nursing homes are like this tho..good and bad everywhere.

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Baking Nurse,

(((hugs))) to you, but KUDOs as well!!! I have been where you are and it is not an easy place to be.

I took my "dream" job, but it turned out to be a nightmare:

*Nurses ordering medications without calling MD (not standing orders!)

*Nurses writing discharge orders, and no call to MD

*UAPs giving discharge instructions

*writing Telephone orders for verbal orders

I had a frank discussion with the manager and told her that I would not be putting my license or integrety on the line for this position. She had no clue that this was happening. She wants me to come back at some point, after things are squared away.

We'll see:(

No offense to you, but how can the DON not know what's going on?

The LTC I work in occassionally, is notorious for MARs not being intitaled, missing meds and borrowing, and nurses combining med passes without prior approval from the MDs. And the dayshift expecting the nightshift nurse to give some of their AM meds with the 6 am med pass.

And that DON knows this is going on and approves of it.

They have to know what's going on....if she doesn't know then she's not doing her job. She should be out there checking and observing some med passes.

Of course, some of them can know and still not be doing anything about it.

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Specializes in Med/Surg.
No offense to you, but how can the DON not know what's going on?

The LTC I work in occassionally, is notorious for MARs not being intitaled, missing meds and borrowing, and nurses combining med passes without prior approval from the MDs. And the dayshift expecting the nightshift nurse to give some of their AM meds with the 6 am med pass.

And that DON knows this is going on and approves of it.

They have to know what's going on....if she doesn't know then she's not doing her job. She should be out there checking and observing some med passes.

Of course, some of them can know and still not be doing anything about it.

This Manager is new to the unit-brought in to straighten things out. Believe me, she has her hands full! (BTW, this is not a nursing home setting---)

She is not on the unit at all times, therefore would not necessarily know about the way RNs are writing orders. (if it is ordered and she sees it, she is assuming that the RN has the decency to have actually gotten the order from the MD.)

No, now that I've informed her of things, she is definitely doing something about it!!!!! She already told me that if the staff don't want to do it right, they can leave---I guess one or two already have!

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Specializes in psych,rehab.

that sounds just like this fancy new nursing home i got my "dream job" at .they asked me to pass meds as the med aid on my first day of "orientation" "because thats the best way to learn pts names".

talked to the DON about how hairbrained that was and just didnt show up the next day.

i was lucky to get a job at a hospital.its oesnt pay as much am not putting pts life and my licence at risk.

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Specializes in Day Surgery, Agency, Cath Lab, LTC/Psych.

Sounds like my first job in a nursing home. I remember bawling after work some days. There were many things going on like you describe. I worked with some excellent nurses at that nursing home but they were far over shadowed by the scary, scary, scary nurses. I shudder when I remember some of the things they did.

The saddest part of your story (which is, unfortunately, not uncommon) is that our oldest and most vulnerable patients are receiving this "care." And, to make it worse, they have to pay >$40,000 for this privilege. :(

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No offense to you, but how can the DON not know what's going on?

They have to know what's going on....if she doesn't know then she's not doing her job. She should be out there checking and observing some med passes.

I worked in a LTC facility once, and even though the DON DID do med rounds, during the afternoon shift, and never said a word, unless an error was made that would cause harm to one of the patients. We never did some of the things that were mentioned in the first post, but I do recall pre-pouring some of our meds before hand.

No offense here, but when a med nurse has 60 patients that need their meds given out within a two hour, or sometimes only a one hour time period, how can he/she not find ways to make it easier? I don't agree with giving a higher dose than was ordered, or taking someone else's meds. But come on now, is giving a 4pm colace at 6pm, along with the patients other routine meds really going to make that much of a difference, when you still have 30 or 40 more people to give meds out to?

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Specializes in Day Surgery, Agency, Cath Lab, LTC/Psych.
But come on now, is giving a 4pm colace at 6pm, along with the patients other routine meds really going to make that much of a difference, when you still have 30 or 40 more people to give meds out to?

I agree. It used to drive me nuts when patients would have meds at 0600, 0630, 0700, 0730, 0830, 0900, 1000, 1200, 1300, 1400, 1500 etc. etc. Pharmacy and the physician need to coordinate to make this possible in as few time slots as possible.

Also, I tend to believe that nursing home patients are overmedicated anyway. Polypharmacy is a serious issue that rarely gets addressed and patients suffer because of it. What is the overall effect of combining 20 different medications all at the same time? No one really knows the answer. Therefore the poor patient becomes a human guinea pig. I wish that more physicians would try to see the "bigger picture" when prescribing drugs for their patients. In the end its more about quality of life than quantity of drugs.

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I worked in a LTC facility once, and even though the DON DID do med rounds, during the afternoon shift, and never said a word, unless an error was made that would cause harm to one of the patients. We never did some of the things that were mentioned in the first post, but I do recall pre-pouring some of our meds before hand.

No offense here, but when a med nurse has 60 patients that need their meds given out within a two hour, or sometimes only a one hour time period, how can he/she not find ways to make it easier? I don't agree with giving a higher dose than was ordered, or taking someone else's meds. But come on now, is giving a 4pm colace at 6pm, along with the patients other routine meds really going to make that much of a difference, when you still have 30 or 40 more people to give meds out to?

Of course not.....IF it were JUST a colace. But the one I worked in, it wasn't just a colace. It was everything.

60 people in a LTC is just unreal. I don't know how you ever get finished.

My med pass was probably for 35-40 people. That's enough, and could be too much for some people.

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Specializes in Education and oncology.

I also worked (briefly!) in a 90 bed LTC facility after I had my hip replaced- I honestly thought it would be easier then acute care. It was just me (RN) and an LPN who had been there 12 years. We each had 45 patients. I couldn't figure out how he completed all his med passes and had time to sit, when I couldn't even finish my shift by 11:30pm. Had to punch out and return to finish my work. :nono:

How did the LPN do it? He passed ALL 3-11pm meds on 1 pass. That meant that BP meds, sleeping meds and everything else got passed out from 6pm to 8pm. His people all were sleeping, he could sit.

I agree some meds it makes no difference what time the pt receives- but ambien at 6pm? Insulin could be a problem too...

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I also worked (briefly!) in a 90 bed LTC facility after I had my hip replaced- I honestly thought it would be easier then acute care. It was just me (RN) and an LPN who had been there 12 years. We each had 45 patients. I couldn't figure out how he completed all his med passes and had time to sit, when I couldn't even finish my shift by 11:30pm. Had to punch out and return to finish my work. :nono:

How did the LPN do it? He passed ALL 3-11pm meds on 1 pass. That meant that BP meds, sleeping meds and everything else got passed out from 6pm to 8pm. His people all were sleeping, he could sit.

I agree some meds it makes no difference what time the pt receives- but ambien at 6pm? Insulin could be a problem too...

Why do you punch out to finish your work? You need to make Management "feel the pain ($$$)", of short staffing by making then pay you overtime so you CAN finish your work. It does no one any good if we continue to subsidise these money barons by working for free. Do you think that any of them work for free? I doubt it. If they give you grief about is, report them to the NLRB for non payment of wages. There has been incidents recently in the news about workers who were given a small fortune in back wages for incidents just like this. Talk to an attorney. Do everyone af favor.

Also, if you get injured while you are working off of the clock, you are not entitled to workmans comp. It is against the law to work off the clock.

Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN

Spokane, Washington

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