TheLionessRN

The VA I worked at had almost constant "unit diversion" because there never were empty beds. The sickest patients are in there all the time. I work in the ER and can tell you that I am aware that while I get them fresh, it is to the ICU/CCU that the patient will ultimately go, and have to be cared for. I did not think a new grad had any business in the unit when I graduated. I do, however know enough about the VA system to know that every skill that is needed will be covered, every policy will be gone over and classroom time will be more than you ever wanted in your life. I personally would want to jump right in if that is where the action is....but be prepared for physically demanding days they seem like they will never end.

Oh wow, you mean you can't do something simple like put on a sat monitor??? Is it possible that you are being told not to by a nurse who has no independent thought on her part? Or a territorial thing with RT....This is really interesting.

I well remember going into my new med-surg job. I had been a tech at this hospital for 4 years before graduating, and was very comfortable with patient care. What I had a problem with on that floor was with the experienced nurses who refused to help, or put on an attitude if asked to help with a midnight bath. One of my grad/classmate/coworkers was actually told that she should be able to do a total bath and bed change on a bedridden patient with NO help. I had one of those terrifying clinical instructors who made me feel like I should have no questions to ask if I had read all the material in the med-surg text book. I was afraid to ask questions because I thought I SHOULD know it all. I spent a LOT of time reading the manuals and procedural stuff during lunch, because I didn't want anyone to think I was incompetent. As soon as I got with other nurses who were open to questions and I got over the basic need to know stuff, I was a question asking little nurse! But, then, I had a good mentor once I got off that night shift group...

I personally am opposed to unions for nurses. We are supposed to be professionals, and professionals do not join trade unions.

I understood that the black stripe indicated an RN and that two parallel green hash mark stripes indicated LPN. I know no one else likes them but I would have loved to wear a cap when I worked the floor so that patients would not be confused about who was walking in the door.

after reading all these posts, I do remember a certain unit clerk that I worked with until she quit due to illness...she had been written up a number of times for inaccuracies and serious mistakes in transcription, and for laziness and bad attitude. About 15 years ago, she hired a lawyer and threatened a lawsuit when she was almost fired for some error she made. She accused the hospital of racism, and they didn't fire her out of fear. That kind of behavior makes me livid, and I don't understand it at all...from either standpoint. In confronting staff of other color, I never had a problem with that. I did have a problem with directing/asking a CNA who is old enough to be my mother. Personally, I hate the term African American, because I was raised to be color blind, and the term seems to create a gulf that isn't supposed to be there. We are ALL Americans, of ALL different colors and backgrounds. Once you are a generation removed from a foriegn origin, then you are a native. Regardless of color.

I am from a very small town. I had not worked with a lot of people of color in my life. When I started nursing, I finally got to work with a few black ladies. A clerk, a CNA and an RN. I made friend with the secretary when I got to day shift. I would ask her anything, because I was curious about her upbringing. She and I have almost nothing in common,...she is older than I am, and she grew up in this town from birth, etc, but what connected us the most was the fact that we are both Christians, and in that, we are sisters. Because she came to know my heart, I felt comfortable asking her about things I was genuinely curious about with regards to the experience of growing up black in the south during segregation. We had great talks when there was time to talk. I think that connecting with humans on any level possible is the best way to live life. Having grown up in two different cultures, I think I was priveleged to see two different patterns of thought. (moved to TN from MI when I was 11) Racism on any level, coming from any direction is distressing to me. I don't personally understand it, and have tried to rais my children to be color blind. What I am saying in a round about way is, I am curious about black people. I don't seek out or avoid anyone....heaven knows I barely leave the house when I don't work. Whenever I have the opportunity to be with a black person, I go out of my way to get to know that person, because that is how one learns. So, is this wrong? Is it "condecending"? I would honestly like to know. More later, my eyes are drooping. Thanks for the opportunity to vent in here, LV.

We have a general surgeon named Robert Carver Bone. Too bad he didn't go into ortho, huh? When my ex was in the army, one of his buddies, Sgt. Dick, got married. My aerobics insructor was his fiance, but I didn't realize this until after the marriage, when I asked HER why she didn't change her name. When I found out who she married, I couldn't blame her for keeping her maiden name, cause her first name is Anita.

I worked team with an LPN and I thought it worked out okay at night, because there were never more than 10 patients. But I was used to being busy and used poorly, so this was a step up. The previous job was day shift and I had 12 or more patients with a tech or an lpn, depending on the staff that day. It was horrible, because doing 12 assessments, passing meds on 12 patients, and then doing the charting was just TOO MUCH. If the tech was lazy, or if the unit clerk didn't use good sense, it made things even worse. The charge nurse was a rotating thing and included a big 50 cents an hour and she still had to take a full patient load. I just don't understand how some of those admins can look themselves in the mirror.

I worked for a hospital that never ever ever backed up their nurses in these cases. It was incredibly difficult, because you feel like you are hostage to these tyrants. I learned one thing, tho. If you can ask them what would make things better, what you can do for them right now, they usually back down. Letting them know you HEAR them helps too. When patients go into hospital, control is taken from them, and from family. People who feel like they have no control tend to try and TAKE control in some form. You just gotta make them feem empowered in some way. Also, a word of warning....it is the quiet ones that will cut your throat. If they are verbalizing, there is a better chance of resolving the problem.

I think team nursing is a whole lot better than primary nursing, but, when I worked a floor with primary nursing, the ratio was 1:7 and there was no cna to do vitals and baths, etc. My greatest complaint was that, because that group was mine alone, I didn't have anyone else there to help me pull a patient up in bed, or refill a water pitcher while I was busy cleaning up a mess in another room. At least with team nursing, there is someone else that can be called for a patient need. As has been said, the team is only as good as it's members. My biggest gripes with the system all came from the other member not doing their job.

That poem made me feel simpy ineffectual. I am actually not "guilty" of those points, but I know who is. Administration is guilty of making this profession look like that to the patients. We are not allowed to tell them that we are understaffed, cause they complain and if they complain about anything, it is always blamed on the nurse. I have been a nurse for 4 years now. I was raised by a nurse, and worked as a ward clerk, tech, and monitor tech/secretary up until I graduated. I went in with open eyes. My goal during the first year was to learn how to have organization. I had some fantastic teachers in that area and I can honestly say that no matter what I did on some days, there was no keeping up with it all. I left the hospital I started nursing at because, when I got my position on day shift, I felt like I was living with an abusive drunk and never knew when the abuse was going to start. The day normally got downright horrible after 3 pm, when the staffing office cut our staff with regularity. Our first admissions usually came right after the person cut was sent home. Nursing is responsible for passing trays in this hospital. When there are 22 patients and only 4 nurses to do the work, you have to just pass the trays and get them out before you can go back and actually feed someone. Then you have to turn around and pick up the trays, or complaints start coming in from dietary. In this hospital, the guy who brings the trays to the floor and back is either brand new or from the home for functionally delayed men. The person comes at a certain time and rolls the cart away regardless of whether it is full or not. Three meals a day. For some reason, that part of the poem ticked me off. With 22 patients, two teams with an RN and either a tech or LPN, if just one is lazy, then the whole thing falls apart. A team is only as good as it's members. Dropping what you are doing to pass trays was a major thorn in my side, and for once, I would like the blame to be laid where it belongs!!!

This thread hasn't been posted to in a while, but I want to add my teaching experience from hell. I am BSN prepared and absolutely love to teach. I took a part time, PRN clinical teaching position with a practical nursing program. The med-surg portion seemed just fantastic, until I began to have behavioural problems with a few of the students. One student was assigned to do an OR observational experience. Because of the large size of the class, I had 9 students and attempted to "farm" out about half of them to various areas of the hospital, like OR, ER, and Cath Lab. This particular student called me at about 10:30 to tell me that an interesting case was coming up, and would it be alright if she skipped lunch to see the case. I said of course, and went back to the students with me on the floor. After lunch, I went to the OR to simply say hello and make sure all was well with the student. No one could find her. A surgeon, of all people, told me that the student had said we were having half a day, and left around 10:30. Needless to say, I was very upset, and the whole thing gave us a black eye in our image with the host hospital. The student was given a written reprimand, but it made me less trustful of the rest of the group. I took a full time teaching position with this same school and agreed to teach pediatrics, as my choice was OB or Peds. My area is med-surg, with strong preference for the heart and neuro. I agreed to teach peds because I falsely believed that, as a general nurse, I could teach anything, and was offered a class in Med-Surg for the next quarter. I was so wrong! I could not teach pediatrics because I am not a pediatric nurse. I was studying twice as much as the students, just trying to prepare for the next day's class. I am cutting this short because of space, but, the program itself was so disorganized and no support of the teachers was offered that I decided I did not want to continue there. I still would love to teach, but in my comfort area of expertise. My students sang my praises when I was doing med-surg clinicals, but I was flat out incompetent as a pediatric clinical instructor, and it showed. This was partially my fault, and, IMO, a lot the fault of the director of the program for putting me in that position.

Oh, how lucky I feel right now, because I have so many wonderful, gross stories. I think one of the most unique gross things that I have ever dealt with was the 750# man. To begin with, this patient was only in his late 30s. He had come to our hospital the prior week, and was there for about 2 days, and was discharged quickly only because our resident "Dr. Admit" had gone on vacation and the doc that covered for him cleaned house the very next day. Other than his size, this man was not very nice. He had a bad attitude, and went out of his way to be difficult for all of the staff. One morning, during that first admission, he decided to haul himself up from his bari-bed and walk to the bathroom himself---God only knows how he did this. He was discovered at shift change, first thing in the morning, laying on his face, like a beached whale on the bathroom floor. It took 8 people and over an hour to get him off the floor and back into bed. Anyway, the following week this patient was brought back in sometime in the middle of the night. The EMTs had to just put him on a tarp and remove the stretcher and put him on the floor of the rig. They somehow got him into a regular hospital bed (that has never worked since then) and left him there, on this big tarp. The night nurse left him there, which is another story in itself, and I had the blessed luck of being his nurse that day. Our first job was to get him a bari-bed on a Saturday, and to actually get him out of the bed and standing. It only took 4 people to get him up and out of the bed, and we pushed a bed long ways against a wall for him to use as a prop until we could get his bed. He had to stand there until the big bed arrived. The man had not had a bath in at least over a week. We had an order to put a foley in him, but, I swear to you all, no one could find his member. We put a wash basin on the floor with lots of towels around it and told him to just let go. He then reported having had a bowel movement, and, since I was his lucky nurse, I was the one to clean him up. I had to actually dig to find his rectum, and went in almost to my elbow between his cheeks. There were two people on either side of him, keeping him steady and helping me while I dressed some wounds on the backs of his thighs. He needed to be washed down in the process, so I was on my knees behind this 750# man when he passed a large puff of gas. LOL, if you can imagine this, I fell backward on my rear end like I had been pushed, and the two people holding his arms both stepped away from him like someone had pulled a string. It was all we could do to keep a straight face all that morning, and of course, I was the "butt" of a great deal of jokes that day.