Nursing student asks nurses the question..

Nurses General Nursing

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So as a third semester nursing student, myself and many of my fellow colleagues often wonder the same thing. Why is it that when we go to clinical, about 75% of the nurses act snobby and like it's some huge ordeal that we are there in "their space"? They were all nursing students at some point as well, students who wanted to learn skills and gain experience while at their clinicals. I often dread clinical due to feeling as I am in the way or that I am annoying a "seasoned" nurse. One would think, that as a nurse you'd want future nurses to gain as much experience and knowledge as they can while they're in school. So the point of this post, I would like to and I'm sure many other nursing students would like to know; why is it necessary to be rude and someone who doesn't want to help students learn or why is it necessary to not explain stuff to the student when they ask? I'm not trying to be conniving, I honestly just want to know, so that maybe I can understand.

P.S. I'm not saying this is true for ALL nurse's, as there are some that are amazing and share their knowledge and expertise.

Thank you.

After the day was done, the instructor came back and said he had a good experience, and the best part for him was the math that I taught him.

All that patient care, and he was impressed with MATH.

Hey, don't sell yourself short, that is a VERY valuable skill!! Drug calculations are something that a lot of nurses still can't do even after graduation. They rely so heavily on pharmacy that it's scary. Thankfully, I have NICU experience, so I had drug calculating drilled into me as a newbie. It's a very valuable skill. :yes:
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Someone posted several pages back re shorter hospital/unit stays make it difficult to pre assign patients. That made me recall my student and RN experiences in the 80's when stable post op patients stayed on the floor for a week. That made everyone's job easier but couple that with better CI supervision and less nursing programs in general and it was night and day compared to now.

Nursing students graduate with less experience to manage more complex short stay patients. And the cycle continues. And many just can't seem to get the burden they place on maxed out staff nurses. Or if they have the insight then they apologize and express gratitude but continue to show up and burden over worked staff nurses in a flooded new grad market further contributing to the dysfunctional system.

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Personally, I did not like getting students because I was still learning myself. I was fresh off orientation, drowning in my workload and given a student to follow me. I felt like I barely knew more than the student nurses there!

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Specializes in BSN, RN-BC, NREMT, EMT-P, TCRN.
I take the student with me with no problem. I remember what it is like. I take u on a tour of my ER Trauma center. Introduce u to my friends. Most of the students r happy. Because we know u need to get your feet wet starting IV,foleys etc... Even go in a code and do compressions

This is not a text format. Spell words out.

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Specializes in BSN, RN-BC, NREMT, EMT-P, TCRN.
Students are extra work. Extra work that, in the majority of cases, the nurses didn't ask for and don't want.

But were student nurses at one point in their life.

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Specializes in HH, Peds, Rehab, Clinical.

Sigh. This poster doesn't think this guideline applies to them. It's been asked on other posts that they stop doing this, yet here it is again.

This is not a text format. Spell words out.

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But were student nurses at one point in their life.

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Has this not been beaten to death yet? Did you read any of the rest of the thread? Yes, I was a student nurse once. No, staff nurses were not at any point in the process expected to provide my clinical instruction.

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Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
Has this not been beaten to death yet? Did you read any of the rest of the thread? Yes, I was a student nurse once. No, staff nurses were not at any point in the process expected to provide my clinical instruction.

I'm impressed that you could figure out what that one meant.

Tapatalk just got got a new upgrade. Perhaps the poster could learn to take out those annoying signature lines.

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when I was a student I paid my school to educate me I wasn't paying the nursing staff to educate me. when they taught me something I was grateful and when they ignored me or were unhappy to be stuck with me I gave them space and dealt with it best I could. what I didn't do was complain about them on a public message board for nurses and insist that they owed me more than I got.

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Specializes in Care Coordination, Care Management.

My instructor would have GUTTED us if we did any such thing. Not only that, but if we were on the floor, she was on the floor.

I used to love working with students. That was until I encountered ONE particular student who had something to prove evidently. She

was headed to lunch with her friends. I asked what her patient's blood sugar was and if she had to give SS insulin. She said she did not do the accucheck because her instructor was not on the floor. She COULD have asked me to watch her do it. I did it myself and gave the SSI. After lunch she did a preemptive strike: went crying to her instructor that I had yelled at her! I did not! Worked out great for her. She didn't miss lunch, got a hug from her instructor, and I became the BIG BAD NURSE. Next time she worked her patient's MARs disappeared. Next 2 shifts tore the building apart trying to find them. Next day she was caught trying to put them back. She had simply folded up the MARs, put them in her pocket, and went home. Evil! I hope she didn't make it through nursing school but she's probably upper level management.

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