Ruby Vee BSN

Whenever I am ask if I'd recommend nursing to someone, I always ask the question, "Why would you want to be a nurse?" If they answer along the lines of stable job, interesting and challenging work, I tell them they'd make good nurses if they work hard, learn the material and are able to take accountability for and learn from their mistakes. Anyone who tells me they want to be a nurse because they have "a calling," I tell they need to grow up and think this through a bit more.

So you had four jobs in your first year of nursing, and you think that the problem was all of THEM? The common denominator in your poor job experiences was YOU. Have you given some thought to why you failed at all of those jobs and what YOU could have done differently so that things would have worked out differently? If not, that seems to be your problem. It isn't the profession. It's probably you. I don't regret becoming a nurse, although my first year was really rough. I was too nervous about not killing anyone to be friendly or worry about developing workplace relationships. I asked stupid questions, and I didn't understand the answers, and rather than look to myself, I thought everyone else was at fault. Thankfully, I figured things out without a ton of job hopping. When I was more comfortable with my role as a nurse, I got friendlier and was easier to work with. And people responded by being nicer to me.

No call/no show is job abandonment. You have to have accepted an assignment in order to abandon it. So the nurse who called in sick from a bar ten minutes after her shift started may be subject to other disciplinary issues, she didn't abandon her patients. Two weeks later, when she wandered off the unit at lunch time, and didn't come back -- THAT was patient abandonment.

This!! I'd much rather work with nurses who are interested in the anatomy and physiology and like figuring things out than the holier than thou ones with "a calling."

At last -- a voice of reason!

This is just so wrong. Why in the world would you look up someone's chart? "Curious" is SOOO not a reason! Your concern about getting into trouble for doing something you know is wrong is misplaced. You should have been MORE concerned with NOT DOING something you knew was wrong.

More new nurses fail at orientation because their new colleagues don't like them than for any other reason. So it's not enough to concentrate on the job, on giving meds safely and correctly, drawing the labs, critical thinking, etc. You have to work at your workplace relationships as well. A new nurse who is well liked will be well-mentored. A nurse who is disliked will not be, even if she does everything else right.

I don't you, don't know your practice, and have not made a practice of following new posters with relatively few posts. I'm not judging your work ethic, your practices, or anything except the post that I quoted. I don't believe that anyone can have a perfect record of no medication errors as you brag of having in the quoted paragraph. That was my point. If you honestly believe that you never have and will never make a mistake, then you're dangerous because you won't recognize when you've made one. Your response to me indicates that you have made mistakes, you've been aware of it, and that I should know that, too. But I don't know you. So forgive me that I've missed the posts where you admitted to your errors and only saw the one where you boasted of having a "clean as a whistle" record. Because from where I'm standing, a "clean as a whistle" record could only come from never noticing your own errors or actively covering them up.

Leaving aside the question of your "destiny," it seems as if your current management is willing to work with you to improve your skills. You may not like their plan, but it seems a workable plan. Med/Surg (not "Surge") is a good foundation for just about any nursing career, but especially for ICU or flight nursing. My husband, a flight nurse, says that the EMTs and paramedics on their team are there for the first responder and ED portion of the care; nurses are there for their ICU skills. So ED doesn't seem like a good route to take. As far as jumping to a different hospital -- I'd advise you to wait. Put in the time on Med/Surg, learn the skills that your manager has presented to you as skills to work on, and wait the six months or a year or even two years so you can go back to the ICU and be successful. There is no overnight route to flight nursing. Put in the time, learn what you need to learn.

I'm glad you have a lawyer and you're following their instructions. I'm really glad that you have someone to talk to who is supportive of your feelings. I don't know you, and I don't know your practice. Not checking a blood sugar within 15 minutes (unless you failed to check it for several hours) is a "so what?" sort of mistake. On an insulin drip, it would be a big deal, but not TPN. Wrong fluids -- also probably not a big deal if you caught it within 20 minutes. The insulin pump -- not sure I understand what the problem was there, if you overlooked that she HAD an insulin pump or what. But it doesn't really matter to my point. My point is that more new nurse and nurses new to a particular job fail in their orientation because the established staff doesn't LIKE them than for any other reason. Often times it's just because the new person is anxious and too focused on the tasks to take time to be LIKABLE. I know this because I was that new grad who was nearly run out of my job and my career. If people LIKE you, they will cut you some slack, even when the errors are huge. If they don't like you, you will wind up in all kinds of trouble even for minor errors. The takeaway is that you want people to like you. So, while you are at work, you pretend to be an extrovert; you act as if you like everyone you encounter and are thrilled to see them. You smile and say hi to everyone, every single time. You take 30-60 seconds to ask them about their commute or their garden or their dog or their kid every single day, even if you don't really give a crap. You introduce yourself to everyone until you are positive they know your name. That's hard work, but it is part of the work of starting a new job. Trust me, I don't like this either, but it's the reality.

I cannot believe that there is anyone who has "worked many moons" who has not made a mistake. Who follows the rules EVERY SINGLE TIME and never gets distracted, or puts down a vial to open a syringe and then picks up the vial right next to it, who notices every single time the pharmacy puts the nitride in the nitroglycerine slot or an order is written incorrectly or a patient, who has willfully removed their wristband and cannot remember their own name or birthdate is on the wrong side of the room. I cannot believe there is any one of us who is absolutely perfect. I try very hard, I follow the rules every single time -- until there's a situation that falls outside the rules, that the policies haven't accounted for and we have to make things up as we go along. Sometimes, the rules don't keep up with changes in medicine. Sometimes, I have a brain fart. I have made mistakes. The difference between me and you is that I KNOW I have made mistakes and I know I'm capable of making more mistakes in the future. I will recognize my mistakes because I am allowing for the possibility and double-checking yet again. You don't know how many mistakes you've made and won't be willing to consider the possibility that you might make one or HAVE made one. So you won't recognize your mistakes, won't set about to mitigate the harm to the patient. I'd much rather be cared for by the nurse who has made mistakes and learned from them. Really.

Ya know what? Both of these nurses were talking to an anxious family, not an entitled, belligerent or abusive family. I would challenge anyone to be so yippy-skippy when the family is demanding steak dinners for everyone and the spouse is threatening to "take you outside and mess you up" if you don't ______" (insert absolutely insane demand.) Yes, we all need to be positive and set the tone. But isn't there a little leeway between Nurse Nightmare and Nurse Sunshine, the company whore?

This nurse isn't upset by his second video. This is what I have been trying to say all along. If we're going to throw the nurse under the bus with charges, we should also be charging all of the administrators who did nothing to change either the safeguards or the culture at Vanderbilt. Throw them all in jail, not just the nurse who made a fatal ERROR. It's a mistake -- a horrible one, to be sure, but it was a mistake. If we're going to hang the nurse let's hand management with her.

Once again, I think you misunderstand. I have heard only your side of the story, and I still think you were in the wrong. Hearing your instructor's side isn't necessary because I think, based on your account, that you were in the wrong. I don't really believe -- nor should you, apparently -- that your instructor is going to add anything to the discussion that will make your actions seem more RIGHT. I am sorry that you are hurt but I think your anger is misplaced. I'm also grateful to your instructor for failing you. You have not taken accountability for your misjudgment. You're still spouting excuses and carrying on about how unfair it is that other students "got away with" infractions that you did not get away with. Two things: you don't know about the disciplinary status of another student -- those matters are confidential unless the student shares them. And one more thing -- it could be that the NUMBER of your missteps and misjudgments combined with your lack of accountability (excuses, focusing on "unfairness" and what other students did or didn't do) influenced the instructor to fail you. I don't honestly think you're going to magically understand me this time when you have shown such an incapacity to not understand viewpoints with which you disagree thus far in the thread. I am hoping that other students in your place or potentially in your place will learn from this thread, however, so I am grateful to you for starting the thread. The bottom line is that nurses, nursing students and PEOPLE who refuse to take accountability and don't learn from their mistakes are unsafe -- dangerous, even. We all make mistakes. But when we do, we need to be accountable and we need to learn from them.

Ruby Vee doesn't believe you've owned up to your "mistakes" or taken accountability for them. It appears you're still making excuses. You still don't get it. I'm very sorry for you, but the failure seems appropriate, even given that the only side of the story I've heard is yours.