Performance Based Diagnostic Study-Blah Blah Blah

[JacelRN, BSN, RN]

Hello all,

I just went through a new nurse employee class called PBDS. Forgive me if I didn't get what the initials stand for correctly, I honestly don't care that much.

Has anyone had to go through this torture?

I am a new nurse in the hospital I work and I sat with other new employees, some were nurses who transfered here with lots of experience, others were new grads like me.

It is a series of videos, verbal instructions, and audio tapes geared to evalutate your critical thinking and interpersonal skills. Luckily enough for the interpersonal skills section I learned how to BS well in nursing school so that was a piece of cake.

On the other hand, the critical thinking part was outrageous. For me as a new nurse, I can only recognize what the patient is experiencing from text-book and possibly a few encounters with life-threatening complications I have seen so far. However, I feel for the nurses with years of experience. They KNOW what this stuff is telling about the patient and they have to WRITE IT DOWN! Arggh.

They know what to do, they just do it.

I felt highly insulted by this! :angryfire I had to work my butt off to pass the NCLEX, worked as a graduate nurse the entire time to pay the bills, and then changed hats to learn the new RN position with lots of scrutiny from my fellow nurses on the floor. I can only imagine how the experienced nurses felt.

To top it off, they use your responses to tell where your areas of weakness are and formulate a better "Orientation process". Forgive me if anyone feels they are necessary but for me, it was just a waist of time and energy. I felt like I had to PROVE I was a nurse.

Anyone else had similar experiences with this type of program?

Thanks, just had to vent,

JacelRN

[lsyorke, RN]

I've been a nurse for 20 years and had to do this when I started a new per diem position last year. For me it wasn't so bad since I could recognize the diagnosis that they were presenting right away, ie PE, CHF. I saw how frustrating it was for the new nurses! I don't know what they did with those nurses who didn't do well on these, but if it involved more orientation I don't see the problem with it. I don't think these are meant to be punitive, but to give the education department a grip on where the new nurses are in their assessment skills and prioritizing and to be able to fine tune the orientation process.