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Discussion

Orientation classes vent

So I'm in my NICU specific orientation classes, which is a huge YAY!

Tuesday was my first day; basically the classes go on year round, when you are hired, you start the classes wherever they are in the cycle, then attend until you reach your first class again. So I was joining a group that has been in classes for a month or two already.

I'm going to sound like a total old fart, but they were so young and flighty and disrespectful. If I had been the teacher I would have wanted to throw them out!

We were talking about Vents, blood gas interp, perinatal drug effects. Fairly important things. And the little girls in the back were chitchatting almost the whole time, throwing little pieces of paper at each other, some sleeping.....It was just so disrespectful and frightening. They were also talking about how they were not doing any of the homework, they felt the math med calc stuff was too hard and just not taking it seriously.

Thankfully, none of these people are going to be working with the acute kids, but rather in a stepdown unit; but we still send our BPD kids to this stepdown on trachs, vents and iNO.

I'm just frustrated and mad, not just as a nurse, but as a former NICU parent, thinking that these types of people who cannot even be bothered to pay attention in a once a week class would be taking care of my child! :angryfire:angryfire:angryfire

Thank you for letting me vent.

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I am appalled at this also! I think the teacher should really be talking to the Nurse Manager of the NICU about whether these types of nurses are the ones they want taking care of infants on the unit. If you can't sit through a class once a week and do something "hard" like calculating meds, how are you going to be able to handle any real problems? I don't blame you for being upset, and I would be worried about working with these nurses or turning any of my patients over to them.

  • Experts

As a Staff Development Educator, I can tell you that this is a major problem within nursing today -- and hospitals are very reluctant to discipline/fire nurses for not taking their continuing education seriously. Rudeness and disrespect are also rarely enough to get someone in trouble with the administration. While the Nurse Manager at the unit level may want to discipline such nurses, she may not be able to afford to lose them on the schedule.

If you speak to them about their inappropriate behavior, they accuse you of "eating their young," which in today's culture is just about the worst crime a person can commit. If you pause your class and ask them if they have something to say, or in some other way point out publically that they are causing a distraction, they accuse you of being disrespectful of their feelings because you embarrassed them. If you try to explain why this material is important for them to know, they accuse you of being "one of those old nurses who hasn't been at the bedside for so long that you don't know what you are talking about."

My colleagues and I practically sing and dance to try to keep the classes lively and enjoyable. We use a variety of teaching methods -- some lecture, some group discussion, some games, some audio-visuals, some demonstrations, some practice, etc. A little bit of everything so that no one teaching method is used for a long time and so that everyone gets at least some teaching in a format that they prefer. It seems to be of no use. The behavior is not improving. It's a sad situation.

Our classic case in orientation was the person who took off her shoes and starting picking her feet in class. That was inappropriate for lots of reasons -- not the least of which that it grossed everybody out!

Wow, that's terrible! Talking the whole time and throwing stuff?? I would have gotten so mad too. All that's just uncalled for.

The thing that gets me is that these "kids" give us newer younger nurses a bad rap. I've proved myself to the veteran/older/more experienced nurses on our staff and I get along with them all very well, but at first they're all kind of leary about the younger ones. Which I guess is warranted after hearing about how these people were acting in your orientation class!

I don't want parents to feel like they can't trust their baby's nurse just because they're younger. I take good care of my babies at work.

This makes me mad that people act like that in a professional work environment and that the nursing shortage is so bad that the managers have to turn their heads to it.

  • Author

On the good news today, the clinical educator came by and saw me at work. She apologized for the last class and the reason she hadn't said anything to them was that the manager for all the NICUs was coming in to have a "talk" with them. Next week is the NRP class and since it would be just my second day in classes, she suggested I wait until the second cycle because next tuesday's class was not going to be pleasant in the least. She didn't want to kick them out because they were hired by the stepdown who really really needs people, but she has been reporting it up the chain, and I did let her know what I saw/heard (like people refusing to do the med calc's because they were "too hard" and complaining because they had to stay later than they wanted, but still we got out 45 min early! and taking 1.5 hours for lunch when we get 1hr.) It's going to be dealt with because she doesn't think these people are responsible enough to go on the floor and either the program director will scare their senses back, or they're going to go to the CNO and get things to change overall, including firing all of them.

That makes me feel better, that they need to shape up or ship out. I've worked so hard to get here and being in the NICU is my dream, and these people don't deserve the privilege of working with these babies.

That's good news!

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