rnin02

Ok,please ignore the bolded questions, I wasn't thinking clearly and I now know what to do with that portion. But the other questions I could use input on, thanks!

So I have been an inpatient RN for 10 years now and getting tired of it, quite frankly. Obviously I am not putting that on my resume! But, I could use some tips please. I have worked at the same facility for 10 years, although on different units. How elaborate should I get when listing my responsibilities for each unit? Essentially, an inpatient staff nurse is ultimately responsible for the same things...patient assessment and care, medication administration, etc...do I elaborate on what that care entails? Currently I work with moms and newborns, sometimes I work just with the moms and babies doing couplet care, and sometimes I work in the nursery, and receiving newborns at deliveries...how would you write this on a resume? I feel clueless, its been 6 years since I've thought about my resume or interviewing, so I am sure I am not even forming my questions very well. My last resume just has one unit on it, and reading it now its pretty bland and not very elaborate. How many years back should a resume go? Prior to being a nurse I had quite a bit of retail management experience, just wondering if I should include that. Thanks!

awesome, I actually got this as a gift already, I've just been slow to start reading it. Thanks so much.

I'm planning to go for certification in Maternal Newborn nursing with ncc within the next year. I'm just interested in hearing about what other people have read or studied to prep for the test. How long did you give yourself to study/read before the test? I'm going to take the computerized version so I can register for it and then take it once I feel prepared. Any tips? Thanks!

I think that's the key...if you know your employer's position before you take the job, then what's the problem? You either accept the job and all the rules or you find a different one. Policies change...for example changing from being able to wear scrubs of any kind to only a certain color...if you don't like the new/current policy, find a new job. I've never worked a job where my boss would be happy with anyone having a cell phone on them 100% of the time. I'm surprised many of you have this luxury. Personally I think its perfectly acceptable to expect your family/friends, etc to call you at a main work number (or say on the spectralink phones many of us carry around) in case of emergency. If your messages aren't passed on, or you are not notified you have someone waiting on hold, then that's the issue you take up with management.

My hospital has a form parents can sign if they wish to decline the Vit K or the erythromycin ointment. That form becomes part of the chart. I don't bother arguing with them...what's the point? At this stage of the game, nothing I can say will change their minds...and I'm not going to try to change their minds unless there's an issue with the delivery...forceps, vacuum, etc. Or if they plan to circ without Vit K...that I might try to talk to them about:) But just because its "state required" doesn't mean they can't opt out, if they acknowledge the risk involved. Its their baby, not mine.

I agree...seriously, I'm not male, so I can't say for sure, but how many little boys compare their member to their father's? I can't imagine it really happens that much...or if it did, the father couldn't just say well, we look different because we are different people...or we look different in this other way too...doesn't seem that hard to do to me.

The only time I cried with a family is when we had a long-term patient die. She had been at our hospital for months, going between ICU and our floor, with ups and downs, but we all knew where it was headed. She wasn't a really "well-loved" long term patient, they were a rather demanding family (I hate to type that!) but when I came in to work that night and saw her daughters crying, and they came up to me to give me hugs for taking care of her, I lost it a little. Nothing crazy, but I had to cry with them, it had been such a long, difficult journey for them, and it really didn't feel unprofessional at all. They had been part of our floor for so long, even though it was a somewhat expected death, it was still a shock. The only other time I have cried about a patient's death (that I remember) I did on my way home from work, we had a patient come in with a placenta abruption and by the time she got to our unit there were no fetal heart tones. They took her back for a stat c-section, but it was too late for the baby. There were 2 of us there as nursery nurses, and it was so, so sad. She wasn't quite "full term" but very close at 36 or 37 weeks and such a beautiful baby...mom had been scheduled for a c-section within a week or 2, since the same thing had happened to her at nearly the same time in her pregnancy about a year or so prior. It was one of the saddest things I have ever had to deal with, outside of my own friends and family deaths. Just so tragic for that family. And now that I typed that up, I remember one other time I've cried, that was for a baby being born that the family knew wasn't going to make it (I can't remember why, maybe Potter's syndrome?) and they had a priest there to do the baptism, and I got pretty teary when everyone was praying together. I think that time made the mom feel a little better, because she could see the staff (I wasn't the only teary one) wasn't being cold and distant, we were sharing her grief and giving her support. Its hard to be "professional" when someone dies, and know the right things to say...but usually saying "I'm sorry for your loss" and looking at the family member(s) when you say that is fairly safe. It depends on your rapport with them, how long you've known the patient and their family, that kind of thing too. One of my very first days (maybe my 2nd shift) on the floor after graduation, still in orientation, while I was listening to phone report, I remember a nurse walking by me and saying "is that your patient? i think she's dead." I nearly died myself, that scared me so bad, to hear that while listening to report. In that situation, I certainly wouldn't have cried with the family, since I didn't know the patient at all...but the other family I cried with, I think that was okay, since I had known them and taken care of the patient for months. I don't think there's any magic formula to "dealing" with death, or blocking anything...just don't keep it bottled up inside you. Talk (generically of course, watch out for HIPPA) with your coworkers about it, your family when you get home, write in a journal, but don't bottle it up inside...that will not be good for you in the long run.

I've read that the old phones were the "problem" phones as far as equipment goes, but my hospital still has the signs up everywhere (on our new buildings too) banning cell phone use. We are encouraged to ask patients and visitors to turn them off when they are inside the building.

Well, I've only made it thru page 4, but I have to stop and ask...do I work at the only hospital that doesn't get cell phone reception inside? Or the only hospital that still has a sign posted "please turn off all cell phones"? I don't see anyone, nurses, techs, doctors, anyone, walking around with their cell phones. All the nurses and techs (and some secretarys) carry a work phone and the doctors have their pagers. The only people who try to use their cells are the patients, but they can't really get any signal, so its pointless.

.I agree with this and wanted to add, assuming the work station is one that's open to patients/visitors coming up to it...how do the patients know the nurse is on a break? If you read any non-nursing forums, you can easily read people complaining about the nurses being lazy, sitting around, etc, etc when we know we are busy trying to catch up on paperwork, the patients think we are doing nothing but sitting. So, can you imagine what they think walking up to the desk and seeing someone nursing a baby? Really, its unprofessional. Although I will admit probably easier than finding somewhere to pump and store the breast milk before being able to give it to the baby in a bottle, it just doesn't need to be done at the nurse's station.

:chuckle

I don't have any issue with a nurse breastfeeding her infant during her break, I think it would be inappropriate to do so in an area where patients/visitors would be around and possibly interacting with staff. It seems very unprofessional to do that. At my hospital our nurses station are open and patients and visitors can walk right up and talk to us while we are charting, etc.

Is it an "open" station, right in front of the patient rooms, so patients can walk right up to it? If so, then I think it is just a tad bit inappropriate! A little unprofessional to nurse your baby in front of patients. If its more of a break room, separated from patients type of thing, that would be somewhat more okay with me. But I would hope the nurse would take her coworkers feelings into account before breastfeeding in a work area...why not take it to a lounge/break room area where people aren't working? Just seems weird/off to me to breastfeed your infant where everyone's trying to work.

[quote name= As for a reference to the above, check out the book, "Taking charge of your Fertility"[/quote] I was going to mention this book! It helped me learn much the whole "cycle" much easier than my A&P class did.