txRN07

I hate it when you have family members who think they know better, we had a patient with an NGT hooked up to LWS, but the family member thought that it was too low and was asking to put suction onto high! We don't want the patient's intestines being sucked out with it!!!

what on earth?! I have never had that or seen that happen, something must have been wrong with the packaging, that should not happen, should it?

nu uh! not at my facility, if a patient is starting to get diaphoretic and such, it is good nursing judgment to check that sugar, one of the things the doc will ask me is if I checked the sugar.

The only thing I had to do at my hospital was the buccal swab for drug testing, and they tested my blood for Hep B antigen, and that was it, I guess each facility is different, but I don't think your triglycerides is their business.

Well I began nursing school back when I was 21, but we were military and had gotten sent away, then I had babies, etc. I went back in 2005 and I graduated at the age of 32.

We always have lots of feeding tubes on our unit, and it has been a long time since school, so I was wondering, when doing your residual checks, how many cc's would cause you to hold feedings? I've always gotten 5 or 10, and that's a given that you make continue, but the other night I had gotten back 30, which led me to wonder, what is the cut off amount?

It could be that a great deal of our personalities stems from relatives. My mother was disgusted when I told her years ago in college that I had decided to become a nurse. These days she doesn't ask me much about my work, but I do have several cousins on my fathers side (who I am told I very much take after) that are all nurses and doctors.

Holy cow! I am sitting here sick and I called in for today, and I feel terrible! Yes I know that i should be here resting, but I feel so much guilt for the floor and for the patients. I do hope they found someone to come in, but I feel just terrible, I guess that's part of being a nurse.

That's awful that you can't trust and depend on your own charge nurse. I would definitely go up the chain of command, and talk to her boss. I hope this gets resolved for you.

Holy Cow!!! I just wonder how nice that Ethan Allen furniture will look after being puked and defecated on several hundred times! For crying out loud people, there are so many things to spend many on that a healthcare facility actually needs.

It is very overwhelming when you are first starting out, but you will be surprised how much you retain by graduation, and your knowledge continues to build from there. Nursing is continual learning, none of us know everything, you will get there I promise.

I have no place to tell you what to do, but since you put out the post and are open for insight, I was just wondering, it seems like you have a hard time saying no to people, especially your parents. Many people suffer from the same affliction, myself included. Eventually you come to realize that it is impossible to make everyone happy, and you are the one ending up miserable. Follow your heart, you are an adult, have your mail sent to you, it is yours, you are not 10 years old and need your mom to open your mail. Apply for student aid, become a nurse, when you graduate, you can work, you can have your grace period for student loan payments, and you will have nurse salary to make the payments. It is your life not theirs, I truly hope things get better for you. Best of luck.:redbeathe

Has anyone ever come across a patient like this? Last night I was caring for 7 patients on my med-surg unit that I work on, and I had this lady who was admitted 4 days ago with electrolyte imbalance which has since been resolved and she is now eating a regular diet and is fully hydrated, and it's looking like discharge time pretty soon, who would put on her call light literally every 5-10 minutes, and the secretary at the nurse's station kept flagging the room for a nurse's aide. After awhile I went in there to give my aide a break, and found that each time she wanted someone to put toothpaste on her toothbrush for her or to stay in there and rub her legs for awhile, or to get her more coffee when she is fully capable of doing these things for herself. She is now strong enough for a shower but insists on a bedbath because she quote "doesn't want to get up". I got her up to the commode, and she told me she wanted me to stay with her because she doesn't like to have to call for someone, and she takes a good while on the commode as do my other patients, so I gave her her call button for when she's through. Eventually she came out and said, "I am paying top dollar for this health care, and I don't care that you have other patients, I should be able to get what I need from you when I need it" Meanwhile we had a man across the hall go nonresponsive even to pain stimulus, and had to immediately be transferred to a more critical floor. My job as her nurse is to help her get as independent as physically possible, not to be her servant. This woman is like none I've ever seen before, and really through me for a loop. Can anyone seriously relate to this?

If a patient asks me to pray with them, I am more than happy to oblige, but I do not impose, this is very individualized. Some patients have pastors coming in to pray and family members praying at the bedside, so in this situation I don't feel uncomfortable bringing it up and offering. I have had a patient who did not have many visitors and he was asking me about God and looking through the bible, so in that case the door was open. Like I said, it depends on the patient.:typing

Yes! I saw it yesterday, I just stared in awe. It just goes to show you that you shouldn't self-diagnose and self-medicate, you never know what could happen!

Dentures!!! I'm sorry but when I come in in the morning and see a patient's dentures in the little cup with the remnants of last night's dinner floating around, I want to hurl!!! Oh, and collecting those stool specimens!:barf01:

Class of 2007 here!:w00t:

Don't you have PTO hours that you earn? I usually cash those in when I am sick, there is always plenty of hours left over for vacation time.

What drives me nuts is when patients come in with a stroke, and as a result they cannot swallow without aspirating, a dysphagiogram is done, and they fail miserably, they are made NPO and the family goes crazy, and acts like we are being mean. I have caught family members sneaking patients food and drink when they are running high fevers and have junky lungs!

I work the 5 8-hr shifts and I would much rather work 3 12's, it seems like i'm never home, and all I do is work.

This is SO common, I am experiencing firsthand at work, unfortunately. I am a new RN and there are so many things that I was not taught during my orientation time, so the only way I learn them is by getting rude comments by other nurses that I didn't do something right, or that I missed something that I didn't realize because I was never taught to look for that something in the first place! Now I understand why there is a shortage, this is the first time I ever questioned if I chose the right profession.

I am a new RN, and I have been working on a med-surg floor for 8 months now, and up until this point things have been going well. Yesterday we had students on our floor, and I love having a student because I was one just a short time ago, but I had 4 nursing students on my cart, plus 7 patients to take care of, as well as a doctor coming in to do a bone marrow biopsy on one of my patients that I had to assist with, plus a new admission! Needless to say, I worked my tail off all day without even breaking for breakfast or lunch. Things were hectic but everything was given and done on time. Well, I came in this morning to find out that the night nurse who had my patients wrote me up because I forgot to give the ordered Phenergan to the patient before the biopsy. I did give the dilaudid which sedated the patient more than enough and she slept through the whole procedure. I spoke with my manager and she said that she saw how hectic it was for me, and not to worry about it, but I am shocked that this nurse who wasn't even there took it upon herself to write me up, and now this goes on my record. I love my patients, and it eats me up inside when I forget something, I admit my mistake, but should one nurse be allowed to write up another one without consulting the boss first? I've been crying all afternoon about this, and feel like I need to quit, the incompetence that I feel is immeasurable.:urgycld:

I know you don't want to ever take that ring off, but do it anyway. It is too special to get all gunky so soon, after awhile there will be a lot of wear and tear on that ring. I leave mine at home because I would be devastated if something happened to it.

jojotoo makes an excellent point, you can't please everyone. At my work there are nurses whose perfume is strong, and others whom you can tell they just stepped out to smoke, and yet others who are wearing the ugliest scrubs I've ever seen, and others whose hair looks like they are hitting the dance clubs after work, blah blah blah, I guess the important thing is that we all have a common goal at the work place and that should be our primary concern.

I sure hope any woman, not just nurses, wants to marry a man whom they love, and they are compatible with. It sickens me to think that someone would marry solely because the person is a doctor. I wouldn't replace my sweet husband for the richest doctor in the world. He doesn't earn a lot of money, but he is my soul mate and you can't put a price on that.