nursecassia

I completely disagree...You made a mistake, an err in judgement..Part of nursing is being accountable for our mistakes, which you did. You didnt abandon anyone, you told that nurse that you needed to step out....she should have taken over those patients care, plus she should have been overseeing your care in the first place so those patients were not alone.. I can see them putting you on a learning plan but failing you was not the right thing to do. From here this is my advice.. Age is just a number...in the grand scheme of things, it takes you longer to graduate...so what, you still will graduate and then you will be responsible for your own practice...THen you can be a supportive nurse for students so you dont make anyone feel the way that crappy nurse made you feel. It may take you a little longer to get there, but the point is you WILL get there this is just a unfortunate bump in the road. The only person you let down is you, im sure your family supports you just as much now as they didn before.

I feel the EXACT same way..I dont know what I want to do next...I think of all the areas and NP and I cant make up my mind.

thank you for your input...The reason I am asking is we are having a hospital wide competition to see which area can come up with the best team building exercise or event etc etc... Personally I think it is fluffy crap, and I too agree that things would run much smoother if more emphasis was put on each person being more supportive and helpful..Sadly where I am, we are short staffed, there are major changes happening and people arent as willing to help as they used to be....My suggestion was that once a month we have get togethers at a different persons house each time, so we can get to know each other and bond without the stresses of work...so when we do return to work, we have more respect for the individuals we all are and hopefully in turn work together... Im thinking that whatever activity it is, that it is off site. But I need suggestions, all suggestions..Things to do at work and away from work to help boost morale...The winning ward gets a staff room makeover or something..

I work on an ortho neuro floor where the morale is not that great....Im trying to come up with some team building excercises or ideas...I need help...what do you think would work to boost moral and team building???

if he is needing a prn with a scheduled I would just get the doc to increase the dosing of the scheduled..It isnt uncommon for us to give 2 t3s regularly, plus give things like hydromorph or morphine prn on top of it..I wouldnt think this as a med error at all.

I think you did the right thing..you asked another person for help and acted in the patients best interest with the knowledge you had. I would contact the physician and explain the situation and have him evaluate it, after all this is something they should be following up with anyways.

I would do what you would normally do for a local patient....I would contact the local police department then let them decide how to proceed with any investigation...

we have syringes, we dont change them until they are empty...we dont have any protocol on how often to change them...we change the IV tubing which includes that of the PCA every 72 hours however usually our PCAs are only being used for 24-48 hours at the most.

I have answered bells of palliative patients who have rang to ask me who the man in black is standing at the foot of their bed...I ask if the man is scary and they always reply no, but wholly man does it ever freak the crap out of me...we also have a 4 bed room on our floor that numerous people have reported seeing something under the one bed..I havent seen it thank god.... There was also this one night shift, which was more of a divine intervention more than anything that touched me so deeply that I cried for 2 days afterwards cause I just couldnt believe it... It was my very first night shift ever, it was supposed to be orientation but since we were short I was just thrown in there...I went on break and set my clock for an hour cause we would usually sleep...I hear my alarm go off and I am panicked because I have this feeling that I have to go back out right this minute like I was late for something..I wake up the others who are mad at me cause they swear they still have 15 minutes, but I am positive we must go back right now...so we go back, I check on my patients, the first door I enter is ice cold my hair stands up and I watch my patient take his last breath...so I call a code, code teams comes so fast and end up resucitating him he goes to ICU....I sit down for a moment to catch my breathe and chart and the alarm I thought went off then goes off, and I swear to this day time stood still for 15 min cause when i checked my watch I swear it was the exact same time it was when I came back from break...it was meant to be, something told me to go back to save this mans life...if it was 15 min later he would have died for sure...

I think you did an amazing job...and I think that no matter how well we do it is in our nature to go back and reflect and think of how we could have done things differently even though we know we did the best we could..dont be too hard on yourself, you did what any prudent nurse would have done, and should a similar situation arise you will know what you need to do..chalk it up to experience and move on...that day was definitely not your worst and not your best to come, each day is different...Dont listen to anyone on here with negativity, we can only go on what we read since we were not walking in your shoes.

i work on a floor that used to be notorious for this...when I started I made it very clear to the staff I worked with in no uncertain terms that I would not be tolerant of that type of behavior..I have been there a year, Ive been open and honest with lots of them and let them know what I have observed and things on the floor have gotten so much better..there is more open dialogue about issues upfront instead of letting them stew or discussing them with other people and the floor is doing so much better. It is starting to become the place people want to work instead of running away crying because of crabby nurses. The days and nights go by so much better when you are working with people you care about and can trust, and people that know how to have a good time and not ruin it.

where i work, you can still use a picc that has come out a bit because it essentially just becomes a regular IV line...it is migrating in we were taught that would be a problem.

I think you just have to protect yourself from people as if they did have it, dont stand too close in the line of fire and wash your hands...It is everywhere, I know for a fact some nurses I work with have it....Just keep yourself healthy, if you spend time overthinking what you could get you will start to drive yourself insane.

people like this will get theirs, its called Karma...this person will get caught one day be it tomorrow or the next day...have you written your final yet?? one quiz wont determine anything, lets see if they pass the final...your NCLEX I believe...I think if you report it will be your word against theirs.

I work in Canada and I can attest to the fact that we do have HUGE staffing shortages with nurses and doctors, our equipment in some areas is older...The wait time was horrible, and we do often have to wait hours to get into emergency departments however can you complain about the care you recieved by these staff?? They clearly assessed you and triaged you according to your injury, and let the more acutely ill in ahead of you...You fell down the stairs and thought you would have internal injuries, in 10 hours of waiting you would have presented with some other symptoms demonstrating this..I have full confidence that you were 100 percent safe while you were waiting. That fractured bone, if you needed surgery for it how much would it cost you?? Canada= 0 dollars, no loans nothing... as for the soap etc, that is housekeepings responsibility, if it were that bad I would have complained so maybe they would get more housekeeping staff..( we dont have enough where I am either) As for the staph, you are KIDDING YOURSELF if you think that the hospital you then went to for 2 hours doesnt have any.....Sounds like you were in a little hole in the wall and not an urban centre city. Im not saying that our system isnt flawed, it is and sometimes I just want to bang my head on the wall because I know what we need and there isnt enough funds to get it...but at the end of the day it may not be perfect but it is free. And this business about government control?? it is all government controlled no matter how you look at it...the governement controls everything, they are foolish to let the major corporations have a say on who gets care and who doesnt...those private companies dont want to pay for prevention because the sicker you people get the more money they make. Open your eyes people, dont buy into all the crap they have been shoving down your throats for years...No System is perfect but there is a lesser of the two evils.