psnurse

Well I guess it would depend on who you ask. But since you are asking me, the ER is the only place I want to be. Went to nurse practitioner school to be a ER NP. I worked critical care before coming to the ED but found that the ED is the place that f...

I think it is a great idea. It is already happening. I am sure the AMA is whining about it, but it is happening anyway. I hope to attend one of the programs and have been investigating. What would be wrong with nurse practitioners having increasing ...

I have been an ED nurse for awhile and recently started my first NP job in the ED. I don't have great websites, but I did find some really helpful books on the ACEP website. ACLS and PALS is also available these days online. I went to the AANP confe...

Yes you can make 6 figures as an NP. Started my first NP job recently making that with full benefits package. Working ED in Tennessee and the job is fantastic.

Interesting. I hadn't really thought about this topic until just now. I will finish my MSN for FNP in August 2004. I haven't caught anyone referring to me in any proprietory way. I haven't heard anyone refer to my FNP clinical preceptor in any propri...

Should nurses be allowed to strike? Absolutely! This is a personal choice each nurse must make. When the choice is made they must also be prepared to live with the consequences this may cause in their life. You see, I am currently a scab. Not by vir...

After 10 years, I still don't do snot. It isn't the trach thing that bothers me, the ET tubes are ok. But let someone actually spit a specimen into a cup and I lose it. This was confirmed the other day in the ED when a patient was coughing on arrival...

I heard that same thing about Opryland, the amusement park. I lived in Alabama, not far across the Tennessee line for a few years. I miss it and am thinking about Tennessee when I finish my Masters.

My daughter doesn't come to me to tell me about her sore throat without a flashlight She never calls to come home from school because her brother set the go back to class example.

What a ludicrous bunch of nonsense. My job is not to set the perfect example.... my job is to present the facts. The decision about what to do with those facts lies with the patient. There is personal responsibility involved when making health care d...

I have been assigned to root out information on Progressive Care Units to hopefully head off redesign efforts that will upset the apple cart of the nurses working fulltime in one of the units I float to on a regular basis. Answers to the following qu...

I am not a manager, but my manager has a good approach. She requires all complaints to be backed up with specific examples of the offending behavior. Investigating even small complaints has cut down on the back biting in our unit.

I just took a Baylor... well it is called "weekend option". 6a - 6p every Sat and Sun. Should work out great for school.

When Medicaid went HMO where I live we started collecting money for services. We provided the medical screening, but if no emergency condition was determined to exist they could pay up front or see their medicaid doc in the AM.

Triage into three categories.... emergent, urgent, and non-urgent. Emergent means RIGHT NOW even if you think not humanly possible. Urgent means as soon as humanly possible. And non-urgent can wait as long as necessary.

Yes diabetic neuropathy causes pain. Sometimes severe pain. Neurontin can be helpful. But if not narcotics are indicated. Research shows that tolerance to narcotics may begin to develop as early as 2 weeks after regular dosing. The sustained release...

No I haven't had to do that. I have been lucky to work with mostly competent docs. I did have a group of docs write a letter about me to my manager however. I question everything that seems out of place. It appears these docs found my questions offe...

Here I go... disagreeing again. I don't think you should know about drills of any kind in advance. The purpose of them is to test readiness. What you know without having reviewed the policy that week you knew a drill was possible. Afterall, actual em...

I read these posts sometimes and think I must have just been born with a set of brass balls or something. The concept of letting someone abuse you to make your life easier is foreign to me. Not that I am not fair or that I haven't worked with my shar...

Matt, in response to your question about the lab and the ED.... YES!!! Getting O neg in the ED is a pain too. There is a form that has to be signed before the blood is released by the doctor no less, stating that he realizes the blood we are about to...

My mom used to listen to my stories and ask "So what do the doctors do?" I said, "Well sometimes they actually call you back." She also thought shift diff should be for day shift. My sis is also a nurse, we avoid political conversations because they...

This is that old double edged sword. They don't have the experience to make you comfortable giving them major trauma, but if you don't give them major trauma, chest pains, ect., they won't get the experience for all of you to be comfortable. New ED n...

I think nursing is a good route, obviously. I also found that dealing with the same people day after day, hour after hour, was not my thing. But I did find my thing in the emergency department. A mix of walkie talkies and criticals. Lots of conversat...

I am confused about IV push meds and IV certification. Where I live only LPN's are required to have an IV certification. Even after that, they still can't push meds. So if this is the case, the preceptor is requiring something outside the scope of pr...

I saw someone else mentioned crate training. I just wanted to say that whatever kind of dog you end up with (if you end up with a dog), crate training is fabulous. With a puppy, they can't stay in the crate for an entire 12 hour shift. And for the f...