brewerpaul

Here in NY state there's a law that when a nurse's time on the job exceeds 16 hours in a 24 hr period, he/she must be relieved. This may apply to other workers too- I just don't know. Yesterday I was on call. Worked 7a-3p regular time and then ende...

My feeling is that staffing is a management issue, so they should manage it instead of passing the buck downstream.

An obstructed kidneys, one or two, is always an emergency. Leaving it til the next day could lead to damage, especially if the patient has a history of recurrent obstructions. Luckily, as call cases go, they're pretty short.

We use warmed glycine or saline for turp or turbt procedures (depending on the equipment used). Our OR has a policy of leaving the bags of solutions in the warmer for no longer than 14 days. When they're put in to warm, we mark the outer bags with a...

One of the things I'm qualified to do in our OR is run the CO2 and Holmium laser. When I have a laser case scheduled, I'll often say "I'm Laser Man" tomorrow, so my kids got me a scrub top with "Laser Man" embroidered over the pocket. I wore it toda...

Yeah, if you work with a Doc who can take a joke, the battle is half over.

I tried Danskos and found them too heavy for comfort. I usually wear Crocs (without holes on top) which are light and easy to slip off when I sit down. Otherwise I wear running shoes with custom orthotics and shoe covers.

Yes, the OR is VERY intense, especially for a newbie. There is so much to learn that bears practically no relation to any floor nursing you may have done. For months, I felt like I was drinking out of a fire hose... Hang in there and it WILL get eas...

We use Meditech too. It IS ancient, but it has all the stuff we need and it's pretty easy. For some routine cases, we even have it set up so we can load a lot of the default values right up front rather than entering them all by hand. Makes it nice...

I'm late chiming in (congrats on the job!), but I have one question for you, or anyone else in this situation. What would you want the circulator on the case to do if it was your Mother or child on the table? Act accordingly.

I'm curious how people out there handle patients in the OR who are on contact precautions. Sometimes we'll have, say, a foot ulcer debridement where the MRSA is actually in the surgical site. On other patients they may have tested positive for MRSA s...

If there was ever a problem and a malpractice case was started, you'd be glad your record said "sterile", even though it might not make any difference medically. Imagine a prosecuting attorney asking you"Yes or no: did you or did you not use sterile ...

Jeez... if the possibility of leaving a sponge on the floor is an issue for your OR, whoever turns your rooms over REALLY needs a good talking to!!

Yes, and especially in cases with implants.

Knee high, often with TED's underneath

Fook'em! I just do it whenever possible. The waiting area is very near the OR and right on the way to where we pick up our next patient anyway. Besides, I'm the nurse who gets the most positive patient satisfaction feedback despite being in the OR...

I agree that you should try to train in as many areas as you can. We have a small OR, so we all do everything (we don't do open heart,major trauma) If you can only do one, general might give you the most variety and should be pretty marketable, since...

Very well said (you others too). I came to OR nursing from a totally different world: I was a practicing Podiatrist for 30 years. Podiatry is ALL ABOUT patient contact since you see many of your patients month in, month out. I've treated as many as 4...

Anyone else here have dreams about the OR? I have them all the time. They're not usually bad dreams, and often they're pretty funny. Mostly, they involve running around like a chicken with it's head cut off, trying to do all the stuff that everyon...

Does anyone know where I can download a Universal Protocol compliant timeout form/checklist that incorporates all aspects of the protocol? If it's not downloadable, would anyone be willing to send me a paper copy of your institution's paperwork? Tha...

Hey Tiffany-- don't you just LOVE cases like that? As an aside, you mentioned not being able to read the consent in your dream-- in fact you can't read anything correctly in a dream! If you do and try to read it again, it will change. People who ar...

Even though a patient doesn't have a cardiac history, it doesn't mean that they don't have cardio issues. There are plenty of first heart attacks out there just waiting to happen. Seems like a sensible enough precaution to me-- I'd want that kind o...

Here's one that OR staff will appreciate (and it's not even dirty!) After years of working as a successful Gynecologist, a surgeon decides he's burned out and wants to try an entirely new profession. Since he's always been an automobile buff, he dec...

Our OR is starting to make noises about starting this stuff too :-( Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favor of making sure the right patient gets the right operation. It's just that whenever bureaucrats get the germ of a good idea, they seem to carry i...

This is my midlife crisis job change...After 30 years as a podiatrist, I'd had my fill of running a solo medical practice in the face of ever increasing governmental regulations, dwindling insurance reimbursement and growing expenses. In nursing scho...