miwachiru123

No, it didn't take two months for me. I sent my application for LPN endorsement when I was living in Virginia. I mailed it the 2nd or 3rd week of January, and I was granted my Michigan license on February 1st. Just an FYI, there is a huge delay in getting your paper license. Its best to keep checking on their licensing website DARA to see if you've got yours yet. Hope this helps!

$18.66/hour - grossed $39,500 in 2010. Northern Virginia 20 minutes from Washington D.C. I'm an ER LPN who manages the express care/fast track department with a patient load of 8.

Virginia Hospital Center (in Arlington) I think we could use a few more ER Technicians....

I too have the same problem! I'm a pretty fair skinned guy... and at the slightest feeling of embarassment or anxiety I turn bright red almost purple... including my upper chest.. it makes me want to hide because I don't want patients to look at me and be like "what's wrong with him". also, everyone at work constantly says "are you ok why are you so red?!?" and it just makes me turn MORE red!!

I've had to give 2 shots of Lovenox in my ER due to the patient's size (since Lovenox dosage is weight based) If I remember correctly the Lovenox we carry only goes up to 100mg in a single syringe

I was confused the first time I was asked to give IV Decadron as a PO med. Pharmacy told me that they do actually carry a Decadron oral suspension, but the alcohol concentration is too high to give to children, and that is why we use the IV form.

Sorry.. The MDs/PAs/NPs use this for local anesthetic pre-suturing or I&D

I was recently told that we are no longer allowed to do this in our Emergency Room. The old practice was each morning, the nurse would add 2ml Sodium Bicarbonate to a 20ml vial of 1% Lidocaine, then draw up about 20 3cc syringes with the buffered lidocaine. Then a label was added that stated the contents, nurses initial, time and date. The pre-filled buffered lidocaine syringes would be put away in a locked cabinet for later use by a PA/NP/MD. The unused syringes discarded after 24 hours. I am not sure why the nurses cannot do this anymore. It is very frustrating now because you must buffer a new vial everytime, and discard the vial after one use even if 3cc was used. We are going through 15-20 vials of Lidocaine a day and always run out of Lidocaine AND Sodium Bicard in the Pyxis (our pyxis hold 4 60ml vials of bicard (only 2 mLs is used and then thrown away --what a waste!) and about 10 lidocaine vials). What are your thoughts on this? We were told we couldn't do it anymore because it was out of our scope of practice, that mixing/labeling meds for later use by somebody else is something only a pharmacist can do. Sorry for the length post, thanks!

Gotta love my facility required "scripting" we do with every patient: (Before leaving room for whatever reason) "Is there anything else I can get for you? I have the time" (Of course I don't really have the time....) oh and, "I'm going to close your door/curtain for your own privacy" Its actually for MY privacy, I don't want my patients staring at me when I'm trying to chart or whatever I am doing...

Not trying to hijack this thread.... But what about some things students would like from their nurses? I just finished LPN school and earned my License, and looking back on clinicals I feel it could have been alot better. I know the Nurses are busy, and students are there to help AND learn. One of the biggest problems I had during clinicals was LACK of things to do. 8 Students each assigned to 1 patient... There were times where there really was NOTHING to do with my patient, most of my clinicals were on the weekends so most treatments weren't done on the weekends on as well (RT PT OT, etc) Even after helping my classmates, and even answering call lights and rounding on the WHOLE unit trying to find something interesting, I still found myself idle alot. Need a specimen hand delivered to the lab? Patient needs water, but you have something more important to do? Please let me know. Off topic, but, I will never forget the one time I hand-delivered CSF to the laboratory as a student, and got lost, and walked right by a code blue, and got pulled in by a nurse to watch (the badges at this specific site stood out very easily if you were a student) and was able to observe. Yes I got in trouble by my instructor later, but.. hey, I got to experience it.

Hey everyone, I'm a new LPN currently on orientation at a fairly busy ER outside of Wash. DC. I work in Express Care "aka the Fast Track" which is where the lower acuity patients are seen (lacs, sutures, ankle sprains, etc). I am tired of hearing how low our Press-Ganey scores are (we are averaging about 20% each week, while the Main ER is averaging in the 80's and higher). I don't understand, whats going on, why is the Main ER at such a higher level of patient satisfaction? In Express Care, patients are usually in and out within the hour, sometimes within 15 minutes depending on the case. Orders are inputted into the computer, and carried out within 5-10 minutes of being written by the PA or MD, whereas on the Main ER, orders can sit there for quite some time since the nurse has 4 patients being admitted, one on a vent, another receiving blood (you get the idea). Anyone have any ideas as to what I personally can do to increase the scores, or at least score some great feedback from patients? I always hear patients telling me how great the service is, how friendly everyone has been to us, and yet our scores are so low! The administration has gone as far as getting rid of 3 of the Express Care RN's and sending them out to other Departments in the hospital. Please help! Here is a horrible paint drawing I made of our department, do you seen any design flows of the department itself? Privacy is a HUGE issue, because even whispering at the nurses station can be heard by any room, unless they are lucky enough to have a door and its closed. Some of our rooms are just curtains only, 7 feet in front of the nurses station!! See attached. Please give me some advice, I really am tired of trying to be a good nurse, and getting GREAT feedback from my patients, then being told by Administration that we are not doing something right because our survey scores are low. Thanks!!

Similar duties to a CNA I suppose. Depends on the floor really. On a Med/Surg floor, you could be doing more vitals and linen changes (for example) than you would do in an ER, where you would be doing more IV starts, blood draws, transporting patients, etc. Good luck! Inova is a great place to work for I have heard. I work at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington, wish you the best!

If you are given a lunch period, you must be free from all duties. Even if you have partial duties (carrying a pager that you must respond to, or carrying a cordless phone you must answer) then you must be paid. This is US law.

I already replied to a similar thread... Read my post here: https://allnurses.com/general-nursing-discussion/anyone-going-medical-386438.html BEWARE!@!!!!

I just don't understand... is my ER actually "triaging" people.. or are we just taking their vitals and writing down their chief complaint? Everything at my ER is first come first served. doesnt make sense to me.. here's a scenario: Patient #1 arrived at 1100 Complaint: Suture Removal Patient #2 arrived at 1101 Complaint: Very painful and swollen leg, hx of DVT and PE Should patient #1 really be brought to the first available bed, while patient #2 is still in the waiting room, who knows when the next bed will open..... Sure, the suture removal will not take long, its just the only example I can think of... but I still don't see how this makes sense!!