I am a new grad still on orientation. I work at a very busy labor and delivery unit. I have about another month until I am supposed to be on my own, our orientation is 5 months.
My preceptor is letting me be on my own more and more. On this particular day my preceptor had gone off the unit to run an errand.
I chose to care for a grand multip-3 other kids already. I checked her at 7:30am, she was 5 cm. I requested an epidural for her at that time. At 8am she seemed to really be feeling her contractions so I checked her again. She was still 5 cm. I then found out anesthesia would not be able to come for my patient for a while because they were in a complicated surgical case. At 8:22am the doctor came by and checked the patient again, she was still 5 cm.
At 8:45am, she said she had to urinate. I told her I'd put in a foley since she had hardly any time between contractions and I didn't want her walking or going to the toilet. She refused the foley, I then offered her a bedpan. She refused that and asked if she could use the toilet. Stupidly, without checking her again, I let her go to the toilet. I stayed with her and when she said she had to poop, I made sure it was only poop and not a baby. After much trouble I got her back to the edge of the bed at 9am when the anesthesiologist finally came in.
I had a really hard time positioning her for the epidural, she was contracting so much that she couldn't sit still. The anesthesiologist was rolling his eyes the entire time. I am not sure if he was mad at me or at the patient. At 9:05am she finally is able to lie back in the bed. She yells "I have to push!" I said "No, don't push"-again a stupid thing to say.
I look between her legs and there's the baby's head completely out and with one more push the rest of the body is laying out on the bed. The anesthesiologist calls the coordinator and I grab a towel and start stimulating the baby, he is crying and I lay him on the mom's abdomen while I rub him with a towel. I very calmly say, he's nice and healthy, listen to him crying! In my head, I am saying expletive after expletive. A bit later all the nurses descend on me and I open the table and the doctor comes in and delivers the placenta.
After that, the doctor reams me a new one. Also all the other nurses were really mad too, they couldn't understand why the table wasn't open. The coordinator wouldn't speak to me the rest of the day.
I know I made two huge mistakes (at least). I should have checked the patient before I let her go to the bathroom. I also should have opened the table as soon as I walked in the room at 7:30am.
I am now being told I may not be suited to L&D. This has killed the small amount of confidence I had. Are the managers right, should I get out of L&D? By the way, the baby's face was blue with bruising from coming down so fast.
I graduated from an ABSN program, this is my second career, I am nearly 50 years old, and I am having a hard time with some technical nursing skills-like starting an IV in a wrist vein-I can easily do it in the antecubital but the wrist is hard for me to see or palpate. Is this just normal new grad self-doubt?
