Can't take blood pressure

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I am trying to help my wife out. She is in her senior year of her nursing program. She has never been able to take blood pressures accurately. The way she describes her problem is that she hears her own pulse in the stethoscope instead of the patients. She doesn't seem to be getting any help from her instructors, in fact the current instructor is "God's infallible gift to nursing" so therefore can not imagine anyone else having problem that is legitimate. Has anyone heard of someone else having a similar problem? How did they work around it? My wife's instructor says she aware of some nurses paying other nurses to take BP's for them because for one reason or another they are unable to. Thanks in advance for your help.

Dan

Specializes in Gerontological, cardiac, med-surg, peds.

***ahem*** everyone, let's keep this conversation civil, please. address the issue at hand and avoid personal attacks or unnecessary harsh over-generalizations. thank you.

as for the nursing student, i would suggest she get a part-time job as a nursing assistant. when i was in nursing school, i landed a job as a cnaii in a ventilator unit. i only worked one 12-hr shift every other weekend, which was very doable with my rigorous adn schedule. we had to take manual blood pressures and some of the patients' pulses were so weak. it was great practice for me and i really got to be a pro after awhile. i think this would be an excellent strategy for her to pursue.

As for the nursing student, I would suggest she get a part-time job as a nursing assistant. When I was in nursing school, I landed a job as a CNAII in a ventilator unit. I only worked one 12-hr shift every other weekend, which was very doable with my rigorous ADN schedule. We had to take manual blood pressures and some of the patients' pulses were so weak. It was great practice for me and I really got to be a pro after awhile. I think this would be an excellent strategy for her to pursue.

Thanks for the insight, I will pass it along.

Specializes in med/surg, telemetry, IV therapy, mgmt.
I in the construction industry and frankly I have seen more unity and support from the sewer cleaners local than many nurses.

I take comparing professional nurses to sewer workers as a very deliberately hurtful thing to say. Thanks for taking the effort to reveal your true feelings about nurses.

I take comparing professional nurses to sewer workers as a very deliberately hurtful thing to say. Thanks for taking the effort to reveal your true feelings about nurses.

Sorry for hurting your feelings. That was not my intent. But for the record Sewer workers are by and large very nice people who are family orientated and hard workers. Not really a bad lot to be compare to. That said I appreciate everyone's help in this matter. I found a digital steth and had it overnighted and we will see how it works. According to a couple of nurses I talked to it helped them screen out unwanted sound and amplified the target sound and it may give my wife the edge she needs to overcome this problem.

Thanks again for taking the time to help.

Specializes in Gerontological, cardiac, med-surg, peds.

I believe this thread has run its course. Many excellent tips and possible solutions were offered. Hopefully, with practice, the OP's wife will be able to master manual blood pressures. Nowadays on the clinical floor, electronic BP machines are used, so students often don't get the chance to practice manual BP's as much as they need. Thanks to everyone for his or her contributions. :)

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