Orientee Horror Stories?

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We always hear from student or new hires who had hellish experiences with the preceptors...I was curious to hear from preceptors who had awful students or orientees? What did you do about it?

If any new grads are reading this thread, please understand this is one of those times to "vent". It's totally reasonable that you are not aware of things that seem basic to us. You're not expected to know them, just learn as you go along. It's only frustrating to the experienced nurse because it's sometimes surprising how much 'duh' material you actually have to go over.

My bad orientee had a very lax attitude about things which I just couldn't understand. Don't they turn out a bunch of pants-wetting bundles of anxiety from nursing school? Maybe eventually you can get jaded or just more comfortable with your work but I expect you should be hyperaware of your business when you're starting out. That whole concept of "someone else's life/your responsibility" just wasn't making much of an impression on her. Example: protocol is to keep cardiac monitor on the patient for 24h post-op. The monitor came off 4h prematurely. This was brought to her attention. Hour later, addressed again assuming she got tied up. Half-hour later, addressed again at which point she expressed that she's not too concerned about it. I think she said something like, "it's fine." What do you MEAN it's fine?

I am so glad you said this because I still consider myself new and I was getting sad/scared/humiliated reading some of these horror stories :scrying:

I have witnessed fellow nursing students who really just scared me, in nursing school clinical. We had to give report to our preceptor, and I witnessed a fellow student argue with our preceptor for 5 minutes when she was asked if her patient had an IV and if so, what was its location. The student said NO over and over, and she had been in the room numerous times to assess the patient. Well the preceptor goes in the room and lo and behold, IV in the patient's right AC. The student was just like "we'll I guess there was one" and walked away. :wideyed:

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I was preceptor for a nurse who was very naive and innocent. She was really bothered by things like pericare on men, placing catheters in men, and putting telemetry electrodes on men. We had a man who injured his member (don't remember how, but it had a bunch of lacerations) and she refused to look at it. When the doctor wanted it scrubbed so he could suture, she refused to do it. She also had issues with words like marijuana and methamphetamine...she said she was more comfortable just calling it "dope." And...she refused to use the term "senile dementia" even though it is a proper term with its very own ICD-9 code...she crossed out the word "senile" on every Kardex it appeared on.

She ended up turning out alright though...didn't stay very long though.

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Specializes in ER, Addictions, Geriatrics.
I was preceptor for a nurse who was very naive and innocent. She was really bothered by things like pericare on men, placing catheters in men, and putting telemetry electrodes on men. We had a man who injured his member (don’t remember how, but it had a bunch of lacerations) and she refused to look at it. When the doctor wanted it scrubbed so he could suture, she refused to do it. She also had issues with words like marijuana and methamphetamine…she said she was more comfortable just calling it “dope.” And…she refused to use the term “senile dementia” even though it is a proper term with its very own ICD-9 code…she crossed out the word “senile” on every Kardex it appeared on.

She ended up turning out alright though…didn’t stay very long though.

oh dear. We had a younger girl who was a student in her final semester that was a little like that. Her preceptor gave her all the male assignments to kind of break her in. The preceptor went with her to perform all the hygiene and foley insertions to ease some of the discomfort but after a couple of months she was much better.

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I wasn't precepting, but had a student ask me once,"how often do the patients sit up when you're doing post mortem care?"

I was very confused until she explained to me that she was under the impression that even though they are dead, they still have "nervous reactions" and can sit up and struggle, etc.

I told that is a zombie, not a patient.

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I wasn't precepting, but had a student ask me once,"how often do the patients sit up when you're doing post mortem care?"

I was very confused until she explained to me that she was under the impression that even though they are dead, they still have "nervous reactions" and can sit up and struggle, etc.

I told that is a zombie, not a patient.

HAHAHA that gave me a good laugh.

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Specializes in ICU.
Well as an educator, I give all the patience and understanding to my students as long as they are performing at a reasonable level and aren't imminently going to kill someone.

BUT... As a preceptor (in the past) I did not tolerate anything mentioned above. Here are a few of my favorites...

MICU: Pt. with a swan that needed wedged every ?4? hours. This brand new GN had been with me the whole orientation (thus far). Seemed pretty OK. Well we walked into the room, wedged, and a doctor had pulled me into the doorway to ask about out other patient. I walk back over and the nurse if pushing a 10 mL saline flush through the balloon port. I'm pretty sure that I said some not nice words. Another time, he grabbed a 250 mL bag and began infusing it. However, it was levophed rather than vancomycin... Infusing at 125 an hour. His stance "well vancomycin always comes in a 250 mL bag.". A few weeks after they cut the cord, he was fired for giving a 10L bolus to a patient with a 15% EF with a low BP. He didn't understand why he shouldn't have questioned the MDs orders. Patient needed tubed and everything.

BMT: One brand new GN, who wasn't sure why she (a BSN) was being paired with me (a diploma). Always tried to act like she knew more and better ways. Well she was lucky enough to give chemo while still on orientation. We were caring for an acute leukemia pt. in DIC and the whole nine yards. The pt. needed chemo ASAP to combat the rising blast count. Well she informed me that her nursing instructor was an oncology nurse and she told them never to give chemo to a patient with pancytopenia. So we discussed why this was an exception. After arguing with her and sending her to work on a other patient, I hung it myself. She just did not understand the concept. The little b*tch walked into the room after me and took the chemo down, throwing it away in the regular trash. Well when a walked into the room a little while later to check, the chemo was missing. I walked into the nurses station and asked the GN. Her response "I am saving the patient!!!". The attending was ****** that the patient's chemo had been of for 4+ hours and the nurse manager couldn't decide if she wanted to send her home or make her stay until she got in.

That is horrifying.

I'm a new nurse, but there was a girl in my intern class who had her BSN degree and complained about her preceptor (an ADN) because she 'needed someone who was on her education level.' She failed her NCLEX. Twice. And was ticked the hospital reduced her to PCT pay. She was very condescending of ADN nurses, apparently not realizing that 90+% of our group was ADN and she was the only one who failed. She ended up working for the hospital down the street.

And I by no way am saying anything bad about people who have to take boards more than once, but she was so arrogant when she started.

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We had an experienced RN (whose most recent 'experience' had been as a nanny for a physician's kids!!) in our PICU who brought- to her first work / orientation day on the floor- a satchel full of magazines AND her knitting 'for down time'. As if! (She lasted three weeks)

Not doubting your story,but maybe she was a Private duty Rn(aka home care nurse)

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Specializes in NICU, ICU, PICU, Academia.
Not doubting your story,but maybe she was a Private duty Rn(aka home care nurse)

Nope- she was a nanny for our ENT doc. ENT doc has three healthy kids. She HAD been an inpatient peds nurse at one point in time.

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Specializes in Cardiopulmonary Stepdown/Cath Lab, ICU.
I wasn't precepting, but had a student ask me once,"how often do the patients sit up when you're doing post mortem care?"

I was very confused until she explained to me that she was under the impression that even though they are dead, they still have "nervous reactions" and can sit up and struggle, etc.

I told that is a zombie, not a patient.

AHHHH that is awesome...seriously started laughing out loud as I love all zombie material...

I've only been a nurse for 1.5 years but have been given quite a few orientees lately.

Only issue I have had is arrogance. One newer nurse knew it all and didn't think my ADN education was up to snuff with her BSN education... until a patient started going downhill and she had no idea what to do. She couldn't find me fast enough then. She had a lot more questions after that patient went to ICU. She was very attentive to my guidance after that. She was very bright and is on her way to becoming a very good nurse.

Or the one who was SHOCKED when I said we needed to clean our incontinent patient (with skin breakdown) up before moving on. "isn't that what the aide is for"? After I told her we were not going to leave our patient in poop to go find our lone aide who was probably in another room. She reluctantly agreed to help. Was like this every time. She didn't last long, not sure where she went. We have the bare minimum on nights and you got to get your hands dirty, sorry.

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Specializes in Med-Surg.
I wasn't precepting, but had a student ask me once,"how often do the patients sit up when you're doing post mortem care?"

I was very confused until she explained to me that she was under the impression that even though they are dead, they still have "nervous reactions" and can sit up and struggle, etc.

I told that is a zombie, not a patient.

Actually, we did have one patient, after having time of death declared and all, started spontaneously breathing again on her own. Didn't sit up, although the image did flash in my head for a second.

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Specializes in retired LTC.
I wasn't precepting, but had a student ask me once,"how often do the patients sit up when you're doing post mortem care?"

I was very confused until she explained to me that she was under the impression that even though they are dead, they still have "nervous reactions" and can sit up and struggle, etc.

I told that is a zombie, not a patient.

This cracked me up too, and I remembered my first job. Had a pt expire, MD pronounced. I pulled pt's trach, IV lines, foley, etc. Just hadn't moved the body yet.

Forgot to call the lab as this guy had q6hr H&Hs to be drawn. Lab tech comes to me to say - "guy in room 73 doesn't look good".

Me - Oh, he just passed away.

Lab tech - I don't know. I got a pulse.

?!?!?!???????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

First time in my career that I super-sonically flew into a room. He WAS dead. The newbie lab tech showed me how she checked him - was pressing her own thumb into his wrist and felt her own pulse.

Newbie lab tech!!!

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Specializes in NICU, ICU, PICU, Academia.
This cracked me up too, and I remembered my first job. Had a pt expire, MD pronounced. I pulled pt's trach, IV lines, foley, etc. Just hadn't moved the body yet.

Forgot to call the lab as this guy had q6hr H&Hs to be drawn. Lab tech comes to me to say - "guy in room 73 doesn't look good".

Me - Oh, he just passed away.

Lab tech - I don't know. I got a pulse.

?!?!?!???????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

First time in my career that I super-sonically flew into a room. He WAS dead. The newbie lab tech showed me how she checked him - was pressing her own thumb into his wrist and felt her own pulse.

Newbie lab tech!!!

That is EPIC!!!!

I followed a doc up the stairs to a code once. Monitor- when we arrived- showed a HR of 30 (vagal after lab draw) Doc pressed HIS thumb into the patient's wrist and said "IDK- his heart rate's about 150!"

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