River&MountainRN

When you try multiple times to reach a patient about their controlled medication that they're requesting EARLY, leave multiple voicemails, and then they call back to complain "no one called me and now I'm OUT!!!!"...on the weekend answering service, knowing full well that the office isn't open on the weekend. And then they show up to the ER to complain that their PCP won't refill their meds and request the ER give them their narcotic of choice.

People talk and 2 hours away isn't that far away when it comes to the small community of nursing...heck, go 2 hours away here and you're still part of the same hospital network! See what I mean? So, folks from the community hospital could very easily figure out that you were working at med surg 2 hours away and didn't tell the truth.

Never have I ever had to work out a notice while still on orientation. It just doesn't make sense, since you're still training "under" someone and not on the schedule by yourself.

If this isn't just a joke post from a "one and done" new member, then let me be blunt: You will need to work extremely hard and, yes, you do need to know basic math.

I count three ways, depending on the situation: x amount of years since I graduated nursing school, x amount of years since I passed the NCLEX, and x amount of years since I first started working as a nurse. It's only a difference of a couple of months either which way, but it depends on the situation.

Reminding myself that a. You can't care more than the patient, b. Patients are allowed to make stupid decisions, and c. You don't have to like all of your patients. It's saving me a lot of grief and I wish I could have developed those "mind hacks" to save myself from a lot of grief sooner.

Did it seem particularly worse this past week? Because everyone I talked to at work seemed to share in the same sentiment...for some reason, this past week was worse than most! Hang in there! You'll be surprised how quickly the first year passes when you look back on it!

You just need to find the right practice...some will be absolutely miserable, with the teams at each others' throats, the doctors throwing them under the bus, with no hope of lunch or leaving on time in sight... But then you have the good teams who will cover each other so that everyone has a chance to eat and get away for a while and administrators who will allow flexibility in your schedule so that if you end up working 1/2 an hour past the end of your shift on one day you can either come in later or leave earlier the next day or enjoy the OT pay! I've worked within both scenarios, and I'd still choose outpatient/Primary Care over any other specialty.

8 hours is great (8.5 if they make you work to make up for your 1/2 hour unpaid lunch so that you get a full 8 hours' pay)...you get there, get busy with the start of the day, before you know it it's lunch, and then the day is already half over! Then the next 4 hours seem to fly by!

It's one of those "you love it or you hate it" areas...but it does allow for a more normal schedule, no heavy lifting, less acuity (therefore, in one way, less stress). The EMRs can be an absolute pain, but that's just about everywhere these days. The pay is a bit less generally, but the other aspects make up for it in my eyes.

It depends on the clinic...I've worked in some where they average 30+ patients over 8-10 hours per provider, on top of also having to do nurse procedures, PAs, telephone triage, case management, medication refills...it's not the acuity but the massive, never-ending load. It really, REALLY depends on your team. The upside is that that massive, never-ending load is limited to M-F, no overnights, no weekends, no holidays, and-sometimes-no hellacious weather if it gets bad enough that they figure none of the patients are going to show up (or if they close the roads, since you aren't really essential personnel as outpatient care).

It depends on how hard up for help the facility is that you're applying to as far as ease of being hired. When I hear the term "Ambulatory Nursing", my thoughts range from Walk-In/Urgent Care (where your ER experience would come in handy) to Primary Care to Specialty Care to Outpatient Surgery. It depends on the specialty and the practice as to your duties. They can range from working mostly on the computer, triaging patients and answering their questions and returning lab values, to rooming patients to doing nurse visits (A1C checks, BP checks, etc).

YES, it is very scary! They exist and they walk among us as coworkers that subtly (or not-so-subtly in the OP's case) try to sabotage us in our day to day shifts together.

Have you considered fostering (either just to foster or a foster-to-adopt situation)?

Sorry, but this website is not allowed to provide medical advice. This would best be a question for your PCP.