DogCrazy

I drive my old (1995) Ford Taurus. I don't care if I beat the heck out of it driving it all those miles every week.

When I graduated, the only people who had jobs at graduation were people who already worked in healthcare. Everyone else started looking. I know I was really grateful to have taken my job as a tech when graduation rolled around and pickings were much slimmer than anyone had anticipated.

I have discovered that I like working nights. When I first started, I would stay up every night. Now it seems I just naturally sleep nights on my days off. I always take a nap for at least 2 or 3 hours on the day before my first night. I was scared to start nights, not sure how things would end up. But it's been a great experience for me, and I hope you have the same. I still make time for my family, I still have time for exercise and socialization. I find life is easier if I sleep right away in the mornings when I'm doing two or more shifts in a row. My commute is such that I don't have much time for anything except sleeping and eating and driving to work when I do two or more in a row. Good luck :)

I'm not judging, just saying you may want to re-evaluate your idea of fun. :)

Whoops

I drive an hour one way, sometimes an hour and fifteen or even an hour and a half if there is traffic.

I walked in to do my assessment, and my pt asked "how much is the shrimp?"

We're just starting to change our report system for ED patients and have gotten a couple on the floor without any verbal report. I had a friend whose pt was an etoh pt having active hallucinations, and nobody told her he was in the room. I don't like it.

I wouldn't say that AZ hires. I did get a job at the hospital where I worked before graduating, but not everyone who worked here in my graduating class got a job. One person was told she could continue on as unit secretary even after passing NCLEX. Lots of people from my class in Dec. 09 still looking. I did lots of networking with friends and coworkers here at the hospital to get my job.

Go for the liquid. I think the patient's K goes up quicker with the liquid than any other form, anyways.

I would never wear tennis shoes to an interview. I'd go to Famous Footwear and try on shoes and ankle boots until you find one you're happy with, that covers as much of your foot as you want. Like another poster said, you just have to wear them at the interview, and can pop your tennies back on in the car afterwards.

I worked in a forensic laboratory for years before starting nursing school. Any positive results should be confirmed by GC/MS, and that would determine exactly what was in the urine. The false positives are from the screening tests only, not the confirmations, at least at our lab. We used to have probationers claiming a false positive from alllll kinds of stuff, but when you find a metabolite in urine that is specific only to cocaine, that there's a positive drug screen.

It is totally normal to feel overwhelmed. I've been on my own for about a month, and I still feel scared. It'll be o.k., you just need to get into your groove.

How about the dialysis patient who went home and drank a half gallon of milk washed down by a case of Pepsi? Craziness.

I'm working as a new grad on my unit, at nights. I spent one week on days, plus all of my time on the new grad unit on days. I much prefer nights. I have time to go through the charts and learn what's going on with the patients, and what the plan is for them. I also don't have to deal with doctors all shift long, and families are scarce. It's just the patients. I'm loving nights.

I haven't seen a doctor go off yet. I'm a new grad at my hospital, but I worked there for a couple of years as a student nurse tech, then as a nurse extern and now as a new grad. I spent a month on the new grad unit, and all the docs were telling me their pet peeves about night nurses, which I've taken to heart. Most of the doctors here are great, and pleasant enough. I think being an older new grad also helps me.

I would make sure to explain everything you are doing before touching him so he knows what to expect. Even though he doesn't answer, and might not appear to be listening, it's important. I've always had better luck with psych patients by talking and explaining, whether anyone else thinks they're listening or not.

Might have been getting sluggish, maybe has a fibrin cap on the end. I'm guessing the medicine went in at a slower rate than your flush. It probably just needs to be activased.

I think the shock for me came on the New Grad unit when I realized all the paperwork that was involved. As a student, I didn't have to take orders off for four patients on a tele/med surg floor, patients who have 3 or 4 doctors scrabbling over charts to write orders, then patients going into Afib with RVR at shift change, and calling the cardiologist, and getting orders. The doctors, the families and the charting, all the stuff that takes up so much time that I didn't do much at all of during nursing school. That being said, I LOVE it. I spent years in a job doing far more paperwork than I'm doing now, and in a much less rewarding position.

I have done more hydralazine than anything else, well, except for life-saving protonix. MS, Ativan, Labatolol, Metoprolol but I'm on tele.

It's a tough market for new grads. I am one of the lucky few from my class to get a job, and I already worked for the hospital that hired me. Not everyone working for the hospital in my class got a position, I know a woman who is still working as a unit secretary and we graduated in December of 09.

Wow, my hospital is 4:1 days and nights for tele. There is always a monitor tech and PCTs. It's scary to think of anything else, I don't know how I'd provide good care to even more patients, at least with the acuities we get.

Yep, CDU is the obs unit at my hospital, too.

I just finished my first week off orientation, and it was good. It is nice to be on my own, and my co-workers are so supportive. I'm working nights on a tele floor. It's scary, but fun.

I also would have picked the lemonade, but now I'm thinking it was the milkshake. I thought, oh, it has water and vitamin C from the lemon, but the milkshake has more calories and protein.