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0.9%NormalSarah ADN, RN

ICU

Fairly new ICU RN learning every day in every way

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0.9%NormalSarah has 2 years experience as a ADN, RN and specializes in ICU.

0.9%NormalSarah's Latest Activity

  1. 0.9%NormalSarah
    Hmm that I am not sure about, hopefully the nursing school would be able to tell you.
  2. 0.9%NormalSarah

    Second Guessing Myself. Did I handle this situation correctly?

    0.9%NormalSarah replied to RosalindaRN's topic in Nursing

    Probably serendipity that he didn’t respond to his page. If he had seen the patient first, the patient may not have gotten the much needed new CT. Sounds like you’re an amazing nurse with great assessment skills.
  3. 0.9%NormalSarah
    Seems like you’re going through a lot lately in how you feel about your career, maybe time to take LOA? (couldn’t help myself) In all seriousness I get this. Just describe a gnarly wound while they’re in the middle of a bite of something. 😆
  4. 0.9%NormalSarah
    Depends on the area. We have students in my hospital right now from my ADN program, I just am not sure if they have a modified clinical schedule or if they have restrictions on caring for covid patients. You could reach out to your local nursing schools and ask these questions. What state are you in? Is the surge bad in your area right now? We are overrun here in SoCal, and we still have students. Yes please come join us if you’re sure you want to be a nurse! It’s a tough time for sure, but get going and come be part of this crazy profession!
  5. 0.9%NormalSarah
    Aww this post makes me so sad, you shouldn’t finish this degree and then work at the bedside for a few years just to get to a non bedside job in my opinion. You are very young!! But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t make a change so you enjoy these years of your life. You truly sound like someone who could do great in a clinical job with all your interest in science, perhaps just not patient care. Do not be hard on yourself, that takes time to figure out and you are also not a bad person for considering the wages of a job when choosing your major. I agree with the gracious poster above that you’re messaging with, find out if you can change now. It might make sense to finish this degree and move in a different direction afterward, or maybe you can do that now. Pharmacy sounds like something that could be amazing for you! You sound like a smart and caring person that just doesn’t enjoy patient care, my goodness there are plenty of those that have wonderful careers in healthcare and are such an important part of the patient’s health team. Dietitians, pharmacists, informatics nurses...these people are so needed and do a lot for us bedside nurses, there are options for you! Sending hugs!
  6. 0.9%NormalSarah

    At age 45, would you start an RN program? Honest advice please

    0.9%NormalSarah replied to Possible Career Changer's topic in General Career

    I was a second career nurse with a bachelor’s degree and still have a little student debt from that one 😖. Basically I decided I have to do my nursing education as cheaply as possible. I opted to go the community college route. I busted my booty in those prereqs. Many of the community colleges operate on a points system for getting into the program, and you get points for things like certain healthcare experience, grades in the science prereqs, prior degrees, test scores, etc. I knew if I got a 4.0 science GPA and scored well on the TEAS, I’d be a good candidate to skip the wait list, so that was my goal. I know people who went to those expensive schools in LA and they have a lot of debt. Granted we get paid well here in CA, but I still wouldn’t do it. And unfortunately you haven’t worked in a hospital so you could pay all that out for a career you end up disliking. I second the CNA route, but just know that training can be expensive depending on your area and you’ll get paid just about minimum wage at most places. It’s still excellent experience to see what’s to come. As for the large teaching hospitals, I know at UCLA you have to have a BSN to work acute care according to a professor of mine that works there. It might be the same at some of the others. In general you can find jobs as an ADN in CA, all of my classmates are working fine, but it’s a bit easier when you have a BSN. All things to consider. If you’re not married to CA, I’d get the heck out of here, but that’s for more reasons than nursing school. I myself am married to this state, so I had to stick it out and make it work. I wish you all the best. You could also get out of LA and into a different area of CA like a little north or inland and may have better options with a slightly more affordable cost of living. So many ways to do it, just gotta find what’s right for you!
  7. 0.9%NormalSarah

    I feel responsible for a patients death

    0.9%NormalSarah replied to Flashsomefang's topic in Nursing

    You did a great job with this patient. You responded when the patient called about his BG, took appropriate measures for a patient with no history of dysphasia, notified physicians of unfortunate coughing fit with the juice, and monitored appropriately and followed orders. These covid patients are often following a quick and unfortunate course of escalating care and many that reach the ICU aren’t leaving. It’s this terrible disease, certainly not one event such as this. Continue being conscientious as you are, you sound like someone who is shaping up to be a great nurse. ❤️
  8. 0.9%NormalSarah
    @mom_e_bizcut The point I was trying to make in an earlier comment was this: who gets to decide what is “legitimate”? You? Well what if I disagree with you about what is a legitimate reason? Management is there for a reason, and the laws that protect people when they need time off for family and personal hardships are there for a reason and it’s because not everyone can always agree what’s a legitimate reason, so there is policy in place to protect workers. Just because 20 nurses all at the same time went on leave, that doesn’t mean they didn’t all have good reasons. I appreciate your comment and your perspective, I just respectfully disagree. To the OP: by all means, at the end of the day it is still a job. If a nurse decides he or she must take leave in order to preserve one’s own life and family, that is none of my business. It’s bizarre to me that anyone would attempt to decide what’s a good reason for another person to take a break in life. Also I guarantee if the OP is willing to type it all out here, they’ve mentioned it to others at work. Could you imagine being that nurse that took leave and heard about that gossip? If it were me, I’d tell them where they can go fly a kite and make sure they knew I owe them nothing and I care more about my family and myself than helping someone who talks crap about my personal business. This just gets my blood boiling. Life is hard enough for everyone without having to justify one’s personal decisions to every Tom, Dick, and Harry.
  9. 0.9%NormalSarah

    New Nurse Needing Advice: Should it be this bad?

    0.9%NormalSarah replied to kale_'s topic in Nursing

    The first year can be really terrible and even if you change your environment you are likely to continue to suffer from anxiety and feelings of inadequacy. Absolutely I agree your anxiety sounds out of control and you need to address it, talk to your doctor and get on a schedule with a mental health practitioner or therapist! But also, if you are receiving good feedback, I’d try and stick it out at least a few more months. Critical care may not be for you, but it’s too early to know that for sure. Also you don’t know what you’re doing in codes because hello, you’ve been on the floor for 6 months. Those sharks on your unit have at least a few years of experience, that’s why they’re so awesome. You will be there in time! Don’t give up, you sound like a conscientious and dedicated nurse.
  10. 0.9%NormalSarah
    But you’re missing my point, maybe they had a good reason to be on LOA, and obviously they aren’t close enough with you to openly tell you why. Don’t you think it’s a little unfair to judge when you don’t even know the reason? Also the law recognizes certain situations where employers must allow leave and retain their job, so you just need to accept you can’t be the leave police when you don’t know the full story.
  11. 0.9%NormalSarah

    Intubation Should Be A Nursing Skill, Especially Now

    0.9%NormalSarah replied to ErikWeeWoo's topic in Disasters

    Yeah seriously, I’m busy pushing pain meds and paralyzing, and always on guard for immediate hypotension, and of course the occasional cardiac arrest. I don’t want to be doing anything other than managing my patient’s systemic response to the procedure. I’ll let the physician and RT manage that airway. Besides, once they’re done they get to leave and I have about 30 minutes to get my sedation in order, drop an OG or NG, get a foley placed, restrain the patient, all while maintaining those vitals. I guess I wouldn’t mind intubating if another nurse agreed to do all that other crap for me! 😜
  12. 0.9%NormalSarah
    It isn’t patient abandonment if the admin nurses did not accept a patient assignment. I know times are tough and as an ICU nurse I’m tired and appreciate those jumping in, but that isn’t my call and if someone doesn’t want to jump in the trenches and they weren’t hired to do so, I wouldn’t force them. Also you don’t know the details of these nurses’ leave, it’s not fair to say that someone can’t take leave if they need to just because the world is on fire. What if you hurt your back, or you child was very sick, or you had an episode of debilitating depression and needed a couple months off? Wouldn’t you be upset if someone came over and told you your leave was a bunch of BS, especially if they demanded to know the story? People don’t stop going through hard times just because there’s a pandemic.
  13. 0.9%NormalSarah

    Sleeping in vehicle between shifts

    0.9%NormalSarah replied to NGRN89's topic in Nursing

    If you can’t get into a rental room situation I’d just call the hotels and find out if you can work out a deal with them to rent a couple days a week. All they can say is no, and you might actually find a place with a nice manager that will work with you. Let them know you’re a nurse busting your behind to take care of all these sick people, I bet you’ll find a sympathetic ear.
  14. 0.9%NormalSarah

    When Your Patient Wants To Talk Politics

    0.9%NormalSarah replied to KC,RN's topic in Nursing

    I actually just agree with them no matter who they’re talking about or what they say 🤣. It’s hilarious to me. Here are a few of my favorite responses: ”Oh wow I hadn’t heard that, so crazyyyy.” “Yeah I’m not a big fan, either.” ”Is that right? Oh wowww, yeah that’s so weird.” ”Oh no I don’t like that either.” ”People are just going to do what they’re going to do,” or another favorite, “yeah it is what it is.” If they probe me for more of an opinion I just tell them I need to read up on the issue more and not sure I have a strong opinion. This policy hasn’t failed me in 6 years of working with patients.
  15. 0.9%NormalSarah

    Quick! Blame the Nurse!

    0.9%NormalSarah replied to vintagegal's topic in Nursing

    I have another job that is not nursing, and I lead a fairly large team with many moving parts. I found out quite a while back that I am a control freak and that I will put a lot more on myself than I need to. In doing so, I will also deprive my team of chances to learn and grow. I found out that it was really great to give people on my team their own things to own and follow up on, they have their own jobs where they can be the point person making sure this part of the operation runs smoothly. Then I get out of the way, and sometimes they fail. After they fail once and we have a conversation, they rise to the occasion. Of course I always came behind them and made sure their failure was a valuable lesson but not heavy enough to cause great distress to the unit. Is there some way you can incorporate this idea into your current situation, giving your team a greater purpose but also relieving you of some of your own stress?
  16. 0.9%NormalSarah

    Pretty sure I failed

    0.9%NormalSarah replied to MomTo10andNowANurse's topic in NCLEX

    Y’all (in all likelihood) passed, have a drink and celebrate your licenses, LOL.