jdsalina

Oh no! I'm not a nurse? Hmmm, next time my charge nurse comes to me for help with her patient thats having problems I guess I should tell her I'm not a nurse. The only thing I am not able to do on my med floor is hang blood and an Rn has to do an assessment on my patient. Their assessments usually can be done on one line, "I agree with the above Assessment" , RN. I push meds(Yes, with additional training here), I'm acls certified, I can assess and monitor a patient with the best of them. The RN hangs the blood and turns the pump on, thats it, I do the monitoring as do the rest of the LPN's on my floor. No we can't be hired in ccu, etc., but how funny when they are short handed that we can be pulled to these units. I did get oriented to cardiac stepdown recently, part of my shift until more patients were admitted and I was basically on my own. No I don't have the RN education but I have something that several rn's don't have, common sense! (I'm not trying to put RN's down, I also work with some of the most knowledgeable RNs too, wonderful friends and nurses) I am also on my way back to school for that RN license because of the pay difference mainly. Even with that RN on my lic ense, I will never be stupid enough to put down another nurse because her title is LPN, she may be a better nurse than I will ever be. And a word about CNA's, I would hate to do my job without them. How many of you have had a CNA come to you and say there's a change in your patient? They work more directly with the patient a lot and are sometimes the first to notice that change. If my CNA thinks there may be a problem you better believe I'm going to check it out! Hmmm, seems some of them have more common sense than some of the LPN"s and RN"s I know. A friend of mine (CNA) recently told her charge RN that a patient's color had changed, the RN just ignored it. When the next shift arrived, did morning vitals, low blood pressure, pale, confused, hmmm, patient down for er surgery because of internal bleeding! The CNA KNEW there was a problem, the educated RN ignored it. A title does not make you a good nurse!

Oh no! I'm not a nurse? Hmmm, next time my charge nurse comes to me for help with her patient thats having problems I guess I should tell her I'm not a nurse. The only thing I am not able to do on my med floor is hang blood and an Rn has to do an assessment on my patient. Their assessments usually can be done on one line, "I agree with the above Assessment" , RN. I push meds(Yes, with additional training here), I'm acls certified, I can assess and monitor a patient with the best of them. The RN hangs the blood and turns the pump on, thats it, I do the monitoring as do the rest of the LPN's on my floor. No we can't be hired in ccu, etc., but how funny when they are short handed that we can be pulled to these units. I did get oriented to cardiac stepdown recently, part of my shift until more patients were admitted and I was basically on my own. No I don't have the RN education but I have something that several rn's don't have, common sense! (I'm not trying to put RN's down, I also work with some of the most knowledgeable RNs too, wonderful friends and nurses) I am also on my way back to school for that RN license because of the pay difference mainly. Even with that RN on my lic ense, I will never be stupid enough to put down another nurse because her title is LPN, she may be a better nurse than I will ever be. And a word about CNA's, I would hate to do my job without them. How many of you have had a CNA come to you and say there's a change in your patient? They work more directly with the patient a lot and are sometimes the first to notice that change. If my CNA thinks there may be a problem you better believe I'm going to check it out! Hmmm, seems some of them have more common sense than some of the LPN"s and RN"s I know. A friend of mine (CNA) recently told her charge RN that a patient's color had changed, the RN just ignored it. When the next shift arrived, did morning vitals, low blood pressure, pale, confused, hmmm, patient down for er surgery because of internal bleeding! The CNA KNEW there was a problem, the educated RN ignored it. A title does not make you a good nurse!

I'm a new lpn (1yr), chose this when my husband became disabled and I had to go into a field where I could make decent money, get good insurance for him (before cobra ran out!) and do it quickly. I was self employed and making good money as a dog groomer but could not get insurance on him because of his condition (pulmonary hypertension) Nursing was never even a thought for me until I had to find a career fast. (Don't worry, I'm a very compassionate person, my patients are always saying they wished most of the other nurses cared so much. And my skill level is high for the time I've been a nurse) In the hospital where I work the Rn's and lpn's do almost the same job. The rn's are the only ones who do charge and the only ones who can hang blood and do IV pushes, and must do an assesment on all lpns patients. They do have to work a little harder but they also get paid a lot more. We are a small hospital, do blood and pushes seldom. So I guess my reason for LPN was necessity, I couldn't wait 2 yrs for my RN with the necessity for health insurance. I have recently started we night option and plan to use my week days to start prereqs for rn fast track, just because of the pay difference. As far as jobs for lpns, here in central AR I could find a job in a few minutes at hospitals, drs. offices, LTC, rehab facilities, mental health facilities, etc. There are not even near enough rns for the hospitals here to consider operating without lpns! Even lpns are at a great shortage and jobs are everywhere.