Leofric

hello everyone! I know some of this has been covered in other posts, but please bear with me! I am a uk mle nurse qualified ( diploma) since 1997 and with 5+ years neonatal experience. I would love to come live in Adelaide ( i am open to other suggestions but Adelaide seems to have it all!?). I would like ideally to work in a Special care baby unit and high dependancy, rather than a full level 3 NICU. My current unit has 3 intensive, 4 HD and 10 special care cots. any advice MUCH appreciated! Also, please can anyone give a realistic expectation of earnings and cost of living/housing etc, in relation to coming from UK? ( i have a house to sell here too!) well, thanks in advance, and i will look forward to any constructive answers! leo

hi. I am in Lincoln , Uk NNU and we are still using litmus, though are looking at going over to PH paper. We are not allowed to auscultate as it is possible on the smaller babies to hear the air and think its in the stomach even though it may not be! ( allegedly!) I am really surprised to hear that so many american units dont check for an acid reaction... again, a case of differing practices! i usually find just repositioning the baby and / or pushing air in does the trick ( unless your feed is late and they have absorbed it all lol! Ps We are currently looking at more effective ways of securing the tubes... we currently use a base of duoderm to protect skin ( this stays insitu) then secure with either mefix ( white permeable tape) or opsite ( clear, thin dressing), just taped along one cheek, but they are always coming off!

we started using sucrose on our unit a few months back, but not for inserting ngt's! We use it for things like cannulating and guthries etc and it seems to help. We use a 33% solution, diluted 50/50 with water to a 1 ml volume.

isn't it amazing how different all our practices are between different units! Thank goodness there are forums like this, where at least we can learn by sharing ( and, hopefully, learning!). I have heard of the practice of using a new ng every feed, but it seems a little intrusive and passing an ngt is not entirely without potential for complications huh!? On our unit we hardly ever use continuous pumps because of the risk of aspiration if the tube gets dislodged. If we do use one, we check tube placement regularly! Isnt it funny how we have all these diverging ideas and yet each unit swears by it and claims to have best practice!

hello everyone! I am just interested to get some views on practice in your respective units. We use a 2 ml syringe to aspirate stomach then a 10ml to give feeds. Most people do gravity feeds but i prefer to slow push them. i dont know of any evidence for these practices and am interested in how other units do this etc. also, we change our (vygon) ngt's 5 daily, again, not evidence based... thanks, look forward to hearing back... leo (uk)

this is so motivational! I just found this and showed my manager and she wants me to print off some of the replys to put in our break roomm to motivate the nurses! its good to forget the politics for a while and just remember WHY we chose to be nurses... it wasnt about bits of paper and personal kudos etc, it was to care for these little babes... thanks for making me remember!

thanks for those thoughts and comments everyone! Do any other units have pics of previous babies on the walls for the parents etc to see!? This is the practice on my unit and the parents find it helpful to see that others have shared the same or similar experiences as them!? However, it could be argued that this breaches the NMC code which everything must be done exlusively in the interest of the patient... whether having their pic on the wall is... i dont think so! i am nearly done drawing up the unit guideline and basically it means we will now have a consent form for any photo of a baby for any use. When parents send or bring in photos to be displayed , i dont know whether they should sign a consent as they may change their minds later!? Is implied consent enough i wonder!? well, im off now to enjoy a rare nice summers day in Lincoln, UK so bye for now ! Leo

hello everyone! My name is leo, i am a RN on a NICU in the UK. Heres the thing... my boss has tasked me with drawing up and implementing a guideline for the unit concerning the use of photography of babies, and including the issues of consent etc. please if anyone has any ideas or views, or better yet a guideline i could see, i would love to hear from you. Either reply here or email me at much obliged! Leo!