Problems with Rn's in clinicals

PedsERRN · Mar 29, 2005

I think that a lot of institutions don't foster precepting very well. Some nurses are great preceptors and love doing it, others outright hate it-which is okay, we don't all have to like the same things. The last place I worked had set preceptors. They took a class and knew who their resources were in the hospital. If you weren't a preceptor, you didn't precept, not students, techs, or other nurses. We had a clinical instructor employed by our hospital who orchestrated all the nursing students in the hospital. She assigned them to a specific nurse for that rotation. When the students came in the night before clinicals to pick their pts, they would post the pts they picked at the nurses station. Then the night charge nurse would assign those pts to the correct preceptor. This ensured that the students had a good experience and that the nurses with students wanted to be with them. The students weren't a burden to anyone, so noone was mean to them.

This is the best way I've ever seen students handled. I think more places should do this; it promotes a win-win situation!

MultipurposeRN · Mar 29, 2005

On the flip side of this though, you; as a student; must understand something. While your instructor is wonderful.... is she a practicing RN that goes to work full-time in a hospital?

Sorry, haven't gone through all the responses. Just had to put in my pennie's worth. I was a clinical instructor for five years. I also worked in ICU,the Float pool, did prn Wound Care, and prn utilization review. I could relate to what the nurses had to deal with. There was still no excuse for some of the ugliness shown to students by nurses in some of our areas. Fortunately, most of our clinical rotations were great and we had fantastic staff who were a great help. I kindly gave the aides fair warning when the students would not be doing baths and routine vitals anymore, as they were taking 5-6 patients and doing their own meds. There was one hospital, though, where the staff were so awful that I wouldn't have gone back. I was filling in for another instructor that semester and it was awful...rude, neglectful staff that expected me to be everywhere at once while they sat and read the newspaper. We were sabotaged while passing meds..meds we'd have set up would disappear or get switched around..I was glad to leave that facility. Ironically. the staff all complained about being shorthanded..there were always openings, but no one seemed to want to work there. Only 1-2 graduates ever went to work there, and it was the hospital that was in the same town as the college. Pretty sad. I have no patience w/ people complaining about how shorthanded they are when they make new peoples' and student's lives miserable and wonder why no one wants to work there.

RNdec2005 · Mar 29, 2005

The vast majority of the nurses I have worked with have been great, very welcoming and educational. Reading all of these posts from both student-nurses and nurses reminds me of something my clinical instructor who is 74 years old said. When asked by a nurse manager how she could get the new nurses to be better workers and take the initiative to do things my instructor replied, "You can inspire the new nurses and turn them into great nurses by setting the example yourself. Never think that anyones job is beneath you." I think that is great advice for all of us. RN's, LVN's, aides, assistants, patient care facilitators, ect need to stop bickering and start working together.

LPNer · Mar 30, 2005

OMG that is completely outrageous! She will get a rude awakening when she gets out of school and treats co-workers like that. I wonder where that leaves me... I'm graduating with my LPN and plan on working in a hospital while I'm going to school for my RN. I wonder what the RN students will say about me?

Unless they are lucky enought obe goiong to a school with instructors who have taught them the value of what LPNs can share, they will find you totally worthless, not just as a nurse but pretty much as a human being too! Been there, done that and always figure they are not bright enough to bother with. I save my energies for the students who show some promice!

LPNer · Mar 30, 2005

The vast majority of the nurses I have worked with have been great, very welcoming and educational. Reading all of these posts from both student-nurses and nurses reminds me of something my clinical instructor who is 74 years old said. When asked by a nurse manager how she could get the new nurses to be better workers and take the initiative to do things my instructor replied, "You can inspire the new nurses and turn them into great nurses by setting the example yourself. Never think that anyones job is beneath you." I think that is great advice for all of us. RN's, LVN's, aides, assistants, patient care facilitators, ect need to stop bickering and start working together.

Excellent instructor and ohhhh so wise a nurse

RNdec2005 · Mar 30, 2005

I know that this is not really the board for education, but does anyone know of a good website/have notes/powerpoints, ect of prefix/suffix that you have used in the past or use now? I recieved a list of prefix/suffix words to memorize in high school that were medically related and from those that I remember I have been able to decipher a lot of the medical jargon that I don't use everyday.

Also, does anyone know of a good reference book for neonatology?

Thanks!

LPNer · Mar 30, 2005

I know that this is not really the board for education, but does anyone know of a good website/have notes/powerpoints, ect of prefix/suffix that you have used in the past or use now? I recieved a list of prefix/suffix words to memorize in high school that were medically related and from those that I remember I have been able to decipher a lot of the medical jargon that I don't use everyday.
Also, does anyone know of a good reference book for neonatology?
Thanks!

I did a quick google and found this:

http://www.dmu.edu/medterms/welcome.htm

followed a few inks and it looks like it may serve your purpose.

rebel_red · Mar 30, 2005

My clinical experience was the same as CotJockeys and for that I am extremely grateful. Everything from top to toes. And in reading everyone's posts, I feel I really ought to send baskets of goodies to every hospital floor we invaded. Because honestly even though we worked our collective tushies off, in retrospect in private we were far too hard on the floor nurses. Especially given staffing ratios. I can only say this now, because I really have a nurse's perspective. And yes we had the full gamut of nurses: rude ones, ones that should have had a DSM diagnosis, kind ones, lazy ones, fabulous ones, etc....

School isn't forever. Clinical rotations eventually end. This is a great reality lesson for how to work within the culture.

off to order those baskets

Tres

RNdec2005 · Mar 30, 2005

Thanks for the link!

caroladybelle, BSN, RN · Mar 30, 2005

They took a class and knew who their resources were in the hospital. If you weren't a preceptor, you didn't precept, not students, techs, or other nurses. We had a clinical instructor employed by our hospital who orchestrated all the nursing students in the hospital. She assigned them to a specific nurse for that rotation. When the students came in the night before clinicals to pick their pts, they would post the pts they picked at the nurses station. Then the night charge nurse would assign those pts to the correct preceptor. This ensured that the students had a good experience and that the nurses with students wanted to be with them.
This is the best way I've ever seen students handled. I think more places should do this; it promotes a win-win situation!

Unfortunately, few if any hospitals have the staffing to do this in this manner. My unit holds 30-40 patients and classes have 10-12 students apiece. Chances are there will be 6-8 nurses total on the floor and there is no way to choose just the good preceptors. Any addition, if anyone calls in, there will be floats on the floor...that often have never been on that unit.

And hospitals rarely want to pay for classes for preceptors.

ldkrn · Apr 5, 2005

After I graduated from nursing school many years ago I always promised myself that I would not forget what it was like to be a student and I have not. There are unfortunately those RN's that do not have the patience for students.
On the flip side of this though, you; as a student; must understand something. While your instructor is wonderful.... is she a practicing RN that goes to work full-time in a hospital?
Students do not realize what the RN's in a hospital are being put through. Short staffing, being made to work extra shifts over their appointed position, made to take extra patients, the BS from the administrators that "you" aren't doing your job good enough (well, maybe that is because I am trying to do everyone else's job also!!!), the pay really SUCKS for what is expected of us. I've heard students say they "get this", but until it affects you directly as the primary RN and hits you in your pocketbook, you will not understand.
I would say that many times that you think a nurse is being mean, she/he is not doing it intentionally and other things are probably playing a part into that. (A note in his/her mailbox saying you did not do this good enough, he/she needs to work extra, by the way, we are short a nurse today so you will have extra patients, also there are no nurse's aides so you have to do the baths, vitals, and all other needs, so-and-so will be getting here late so you need to stay for a couple hours extra after you were SUPPOSED to get off work...etc...etc...etc...)
So please, as you state you want understanding from us the RN's. I as a RN ask for understanding from you...nursing is not glamorous, nor well paid, it is mostly political BS that makes it quite hard to even like what you do. And since it seems that patients are getting meaner and meaner and act like the world owes them something, it is even getting hard to say I "love" my patients.
When you pass the NCLEX and you've practiced nursing for a couple of years, please post back on this board about your state of mind.
Good luck.

I am an RN instructor who does not work full time in a hospital and never intends to again for all the reasons above. However, the difference is that I GOT OUT OF IT!! There really is no reason, as an RN in 2005, to stay at any position you hate-there are oceans of opportunity for us beyond hospital confines if you just get out and look. And please do not use the fact that you hate your job as good enough reason to be rude to students in your midst. I will continue to protect my students from people who feel martyred because they CHOSE to be a nurse and CHOOSE to stay in a job they hate.

mariessas_mom · Apr 5, 2005

I am a student and have had some really great clinical experiences and some really bad ones, often due to what nurse I happen to be working with that day. However, I look at it this way. These nurses are often tired, overworked, and dealing with understaffing issues. I am visiting them at their house, so to speak, and they deserve my respect whether they have a lot of time to spend teaching me or not. A lot of students complain that nurses forget what it was like to be a student, well.....that works both ways, as students we don't know what it is like to have 6 patients and not enough time to do everything that needs to be done.