CoolKell10

I've been working on an ortho/neuro floor for a little over two years. To be honest, I never given PO pain meds along with IV pain meds for fear of having to narcan the patient. If I had a patient with 10/10 pain I would give the Dilaudid first and if within an hour they were still in a good amount of pain and were alert I would go ahead and give the Percs. I've given like PO muscle relaxers and stuff with IV pain meds but not both PO/IV pain meds at the same time. Just makes me too nervous.

I think charting at the bedside would be a disaster. I know that I wouldn't like it. There's many nights where I'm so busy that I can't chart until 1-3am. By then, hopefully, most of my patients are asleep. I wouldn't want to come in their room and wake them up because of having to chart. I could understand that it would make it easier to remember things about your assessment when you're in the room, IV location, etc etc but you should already know some of those details from report, etc. As for team nursing...I've never been involved in it but heard of it working great and being horrible as well. I guess it depends on the type of floor that you work on and what your co-workers are like. I could see it not working out if you get paired up with a lazy nurse or something like that. G'luck!

I graduated from the MTSU program in 2008. They look mainly at your pre-reqs and ACT score...they don't look at your SAT score. It's def a tough program...as is any nursing school. I had a 3.4 GPA and 23 on my ACT going in and got accepted on my first try. I know that when I was there, they were in the process of expanding the school and slowly excepting more and more students. They accepted 52 each semester when I was there but I think they were slowly increasing it to over 100 excepted each semester. Goodluck!

....when you feel like a drug pusher more than a nurse (carrying around Dilaudid, Morphine, Percocets, Valium, Xanax, and Ambien all in one pocket)

I started on an ortho/neuro floor after graduating from Nursing school. I've been on this floor for a year now. Our neuro patients consist mainly of those who have had lumbar, thoracic, or cervical spine surgeries, as well as, cranis, etc. We don't get very many dementia patients unless they are just elderly and happen to have a little bit of that going on along with their back problem. I feel like when I take care of more neuro (back) patients then the orthos I have a much more stressful and hectic night. I blame most of that on the fact that the back patients have been on HUGE amounts of narcotics for longer then I've been alive and have built up large tolerances. It is very hard to control their pain even after giving them pain meds, anxiety meds, muscle relaxers, and sleeping pills. Then you call the doc to get more meds and it still doesn't do anything. It's just hard to deal with those patients who are hurting that badly (or atleast say they are) and won't get up and walk or do anything for themselves. Then walking is another issue because many of these people need assistance ambulating. Let's say you have 6 patients, and 4 of them need assistance walking and some may take 30-60 minutes to get them out of bed and walk them...well that's a lot of time spent just on that. It would be easier if my floor had more CNTs but we only have one for 37 patients so she is unable to help with that most of the time. So yeah...I would say neuro is VERY stressful.

...when you start your night shift off by narcing someone at 1915, have 4 patients asking for pain meds, and another asking for help to the BR...

I started my first job as a new grad on and ortho/neuro floor. I had 12 weeks of orientation, but probably could have ended a week or two early. If it's just an Ortho floor, then 4-6 weeks may be long enough. If you had to learn other stuff too like I did (Neuro) then I would think you would need double the amount of time. Goodluck!

For TKRs we normally just use 4x4s and wrap the knee with an ace wrap. Most of our total hips are covered with telfa and tegaderm. I'm sure every hospital is different though and it depends a lot on the doctor's preference.

I graduated in December and got hired onto an Ortho/Neuro floor. I've been there since January and have learned SO much. I've been told by other nurses that it is one of the hardest floors to work on because of the high number of turnovers and the HUGE amount of pain meds that are given out. I haven't worked on any other floor before so it's hard for me to compare it to another floor. I am at the end of the orientation and taking care of 5 patients on my own. I definitely stay busy pretty much my entire shift. There are times that I wish I could just sit down and catch up on my charting instead of giving pain meds but that's just how it is. In the end it's worth it when you see a patient go from being totally bedridden crying in pain to being able to walk down the hall independently in little pain and eventually be DC'd home. It's wonderful to see the progress that the patients make. I have heard many nurses complain about being floated to our floor and even nurses who will call out of work if they find out they are being floated to our floor. It may be hard but it has definitely helped me to manage my time as a new nurse. I've been told that if I can work on this floor then I can work anywhere and hopefully that is true. In the end, I think it is a good experience for a new nurse. It may be overwhelming at first but it's totally worth it =)

Nursing schools are so competitive and they are really looking for the best out of all the people that apply. The average GPA of someone who got accepted to the nursing program that I'm in was a 3.5 and ACT was a 26. Your pre-reqs (especially Science courses) have to have good grades. I think the lowest GPA I heard of someone having who got accepted was like a 3.3 All programs are different though, but I would retake some classes if you got Cs in to try to get As. Hope this isn't too harsh...but it is very hard...

Thank you! It's such a relief to have that over with and out of the way. I know that my other finals (Patho, Gerontology, and Health Assessment) will be hard but I'm not too worried about it, I can do it =)

Yeah, I had to just get over my nervousness and do it. Ended up getting 114 out of 116 points, not too bad =)

I'm a first semester nursing student and I have my Health Assessment Lab final in the morning. I have to do a full physical examination on a "patient", all oral and performing everything. There's so much to know; it will probably take about 40 minutes. I know I will pass because I know the material and procedures, I just get so nervous during stuff like this. I couldn't even eat today because I had no appetite...my nerves are totally shot. Whew...just venting! Goodluck with finals everyone, this semester is almost done with.

I'm sure you'll be able to get everything together and start kicking butt on those tests! There's always a specific area for people that just really confuses them, so don't stress out too much about it. I think one of the biggest adjustments for new nursing students is learning to live with lower grades. I'm used to getting mostly As and some Bs...but now I'll be happy with a C since that is passing. Someone told me..."C=P=RN" which means a C grade=passing=RN. I think it fits in kinda nicely. Anyways, goodluck for the rest of the semester. Atleast there is an end in sight and then we get a break for a little while! =)

I'm a first semester nursing student also. I went through a burnt out phase last month. I just couldn't force myself to study at all and lost all motivation. I knew what I needed to do but I just didn't care anymore. I stopped studying and bombed a couple tests. I think I needed to do bad on some tests to kick me back into gear. Now I'm back to studying as normal. It sucks not having a life and not being able to just relax and be lazy...but you just have to think of the outcome. It will all be worth it in the end when you get to graduate...or well, atleast I keep telling myself that. We're almost done with this semester, just hang in there for a little while longer!