old skills that we do not use anymore

[sassykitkatt]

hello,

I was wondering if you guys were doing anything different now than we did before? Like before when we would suction trach patients we would squirt NS down the trach but now after clinical study they say we don't have to that anymore because it does't work. So have you guys had any changes?

[rsh3rn]

When I took the NCLEX a few years back and palpating BP and then following up with the manual BP cuff was called "the 2 step BP method" old idea new name I also leart this when I was in EMS can't hear Korotokoff sounds over the wheel noise

Also in the old days Mash inflatable shock trousers for BP control in the field. had to inflate them with a little foot pump remember being warned that docs just loved to tear those things off the pt and the BP would bottom took something like an hour to wean a pt off of them

[CoffeeRTC, BSN, RN]

Remember back rub rounds on evening shift?

I asked a CNA to do this for a resident the other day (pt was c/o back ache from laying on wrinkled sheets) You would have thought I had two heads..."we don't do that anymore" was her response...I told her "We don't sit around when I work" :rotfl:

[Hollyhock]

Yea! I remember a lot of that stuff. I rember practicly living in the hospital as a kid and mother was ontly alowed to visit twice a day. I remember getting mustard plasters as a kid for phemonia. They used licra and coke for hydration for babies, now we do IV's. My mother in law remembers not being allowed to marry, living at the hospital and having 12 hour shifts 6 days a week. They were not allowed to take blood pressures, only the doctor could do that, It was considered too dangerous. They had long sleves on the uniforms and were not to come out in the hall unless the sleves were roled down and buttoned. They also had to put all flowers and plants outside the door, thinking they took all the pts. oxygen. In that day and age they had to clean and mop the floor and take out the garbage. If you worked in a home taking care of a baby you were expected to care for the whole family, cooking cleaning and laundry. We have come a long way baby!

[lapappey]

Palpation followed up with auscultation is actually not a bad idea, because it guarantees that you won't get caught in an auscultatory gap by inflating the cuff to about 20mmHg more than the palpatory systolic BP.

When I took the NCLEX a few years back and palpating BP and then following up with the manual BP cuff was called "the 2 step BP method" old idea new name I also leart this when I was in EMS can't hear Korotokoff sounds over the wheel noise

Also in the old days Mash inflatable shock trousers for BP control in the field. had to inflate them with a little foot pump remember being warned that docs just loved to tear those things off the pt and the BP would bottom took something like an hour to wean a pt off of them

[angelymick]

I am a student in an LPN program and we were going through our skills book and one of the skills was for administering a douche. Does that even get done anymore and if so, what for? My fellow students and I were wondering.

thanks

[jeepgirl, LPN, NP]

I am a student in an LPN program and we were going through our skills book and one of the skills was for administering a douche. Does that even get done anymore and if so, what for? My fellow students and I were wondering.

thanks

I have heard of doing them before procedures, but I think it is very rare.

[1Tulip]

I went to nsg. school in Tennessee at a time when there were still PH nurses who made calls back in the "hollers". We were given one lecture on home deliveries (how many sheets of newspaper to put down in the bed to catch the blood and amniotic fluid.) We were also told how to tell if the surgical pack you made had been sterilized in the oven. (You made an identical pack with a potato in it. When that potatoe was baked, the instruments in the other pack could be considered sterile. (Of course, we were also taught how to make a surgical pack... which i guess is a lost art.)

I don't know if this lecture was tongue in cheek or not because even then, we knew none of us were going to be birthin no babies in those hollers. But since it was a remote possibility...

We were also told how to sharpen needles on a whet stone and examine them for burrs, and when they were too short to re-sharpen any more. I never even saw a needle that wasn't disposable. But it was something they thought we might need to know.

[sbic56, BSN, RN]

In answer to your question- No our hospital did not routinely store gloves until maybe 1985-87, something in there. We were barehanded for everything, and I mean everything, except sterile procedures. You can imagine the things we touched...I don't like to think about it!

Wasn't that wild?? I can't remember how many times as a CNA I grabbed a sheet with cold phlegm on it... :barf01:

[BabyRN2Be]

Not so long ago, children were still being routinely bathed with alcohol when they had fevers. AND not being medicated for pain - even postoperatively or during circumsion. Pediatrics has come a long way.

Oh goodness. As a very young pt, I remember this one very well. Had a T&A in '74, thought I was truly going to die. I guess during this time they didn't explain anything to kids and we were told to "grin and bear it."

I was in the hospital overnight and I really had some morbid thoughts for a 7 year old.

[STAT AND NOW]

Alcohol IV drips are still in use for alcohol withdrawal patients. How many of you have seen these?

[tokmom, BSN, RN]

Hanging packed cells with no pump. Didn't make them back then. It was 1 drop every 5 seconds. If the patient bent their arms, the blood slowed down. Unbend it caught itself up..

Back in the late 70's, early 80's when I was a CNA, a nurse was sent home to change her panty hose. She had suntan, not nude colored.

[APRN., DNP, RN, APRN, NP]

A head nurse for each shift who had ultimate authority. When she said "Jump", you asked "How high?". She was able to fire you on the spot for behavior that deserved such an action.

Hydroculator hot packs.

Glass IV bottles, and rounding on patients every hour to hold your watch up to the drip chamber to see if the IV was infusing right.

Valium and Vicodin weren't counted.

Cranking the beds up by hand by using the hand crank at the foot of the bed.

Metal charts hanging off the end of the bed.

Telling the patient's neighbor how the patient was doing....just 'cause they asked.

Dr's and families smoking at the nurses station.

Hydrogen peroxide for wound cleansing.

(My mother remembered that the 5th day was 'dangle day' in the OB ward)

Every patient got their teeth brushed, hair combed, and back rub for HS care.

Rounds were done every two hours on the nose, and you went room to room turning patient's in the process.

Walking into a patient's room, setting down a whole load of pills in front of them and telling them "here's your pills" , watching them toss 'em down the hatch without them even batting an eye (now they all ask "what are these pills for?"

ACLS was an extremely frightful experience, and you were grilled and failed if you didn't know your stuff.

Steel IV's and heparin flushes.

No fax machines, no computers, rotary telephones with misgivings when needing to call a Dr quickly and they had a lot of "9's" in their phone number.

All the charting was long-hand and very, very descriptive. No check boxes for the nurses - you had better know how to paint a picture with words.

Sitting in the report room at the beginning of the shift while she read report off of a kardex to the oncoming shift.

Thinking that multi-colored pens with red, green and blue/black were the coolest thing invented for those who worked different shifts.

Remembering how it really sucked to get a run in your white pantyhose at the beginning of the shift, and a huge thing of bleach cost something like 50 cents.

Feeding patients their breakfast tray in the morning and being soooooooo hungry that you would eat anything by the time you got to take your first break after all AM cares were done after breakfast. (I could never eat at 0-dark-thirty)

Could go on...