atownsendrn

Heartattaq - The ER placement will be unlike anything you have ever experienced. It will probably be a combination of med/surg, ortho, surgery, trauma, L&D, post-partum, critical care, and OR. It is a never ending scenerio. The drama (for me) is trying to figure out what is going on with the patient and then helping to fix it. The best parts are when you get to see immediate results in patients - like when you give thrombolytics to someone have an acute MI and see the repurfusion and relief from pain. Or you have someone after a MVC in your trauma room with massive internal injuries and you get them to the OR alive. Or you comfort a parent of an infant who needs hospitalized for new onset of seizures and that mother hugs you and says thanks for helping us. Then you will have the patients that you couldn't help - then you comfort the family and realize that it was still a good day. You also will deal with the drug seekers, the suicidal/homocidal patient that needs restrained quickly, the beligerent mother of a child who has had a rash or cough for a week and she is mad because you a treating the patient having a stroke first, and the frequent flyers that you have tried to get to go to their primary care doctor but they keep showing up on your shift in the ER. So I guess my recommendation to you is enjoy your ER experience and hopefully you will be with a perceptor that will show you the ropes. There is a lot to learn - and it can be a rollcoaster ride. So - hold on, scream when you need to, ask questions, and have an open mind. You will either fall in love:kiss with ER nursing or you will hate it. Good luck:wink2:

Hug your brother next time you see him:kiss .... and your mother and your father and your sisters and your grandmother and your best friend. Because you never know when it could be your loved one. Stay strong Happy Student - you are going to be an excellent ER nurse. We need ya;)

AMEN!!!!!!

I am a KSU graduate. I will just say that I learned what I needed to learn in the program. And don't think I would go through it again. I just don't feel like I got the clinical experience that I needed. Fortunately, I worked my way through nursing school as a patient care tech. So I got plenty of "hands-on" experience at work. But- for me- clinicals were worthless. But I think that is the problem with most BSN programs. You gets lots of great book knowledge, but the clinical experience is missing. I don't know about the accelerated program. The two year program was tough enough with a fulltime job. I guess it depends on how much sleep you need. Good luck!!!

Look closer to home when looking. Acworth is only about 15 minutes from Wellstar Kennestone. Very busy, large hospital - but I loved working there. I learned alot and still keep up with some of my old coworkers. I would probably still work in the ER there if we still lived in the area. I did some clinicials at Grady - I wouldn't choose to work there if I had any kind of say in the matter.

Hi there. We would love to have new nurses move to the area. Most starting pay for new grads in the metro area is between $17.00 - $19.00 per hour. Shift diffs are approximately $2.50 to $4.00 per hour depending on the hospital and the shift. Weekend diffs are around $3.00. Most hospitals also pay diffs for ACLS or PALS or certifications. Pay rates in the area keep up with the standard of living pretty well. Apartment living downtown is expensive. If you could get outside of 285 you would be better off. Atlanta Medical Center can be a great place to work, or a totally miserable place. Depends on what you are looking for. Great experience for trauma in the ER. But med-surg - no way- you would burn out quickly as a new grad. Grady is about the same. Cardiac experience - Piedmont or St Joes are the places to go. There are two great children's hospitals in metro Atlanta. Sheperd's is great if you are looking for spinal cord injury or traumatic brain injury experience. Kennestone (in Marietta) has an ER where you would see everything and get great experience. So lots of opportunities. Good luck!!!

HI guys!!! Psych - See enough of it in the ER. I definitely couldn't do it all the time. Thank God for those who do!!!!! It takes every one of us to make the it work. Thanks to everyone for the job that they choose.:)

Hate tardiness. We have one particular nurse on nights that has a very hard time getting to work. It has always been a joke with the staff. But in my new position I feel like it needs to be addressed. I discussed it with her during her evaluation - and she has been doing much better. She hasn't been late in three weeks. Then yesterday - she didn't realize that I was doing patient care for someone that needed to leave at 5:30 - she called at 6:15 saying that she had just got out of the shower and needed to get something to eat before she came in. Needless to say she was shocked when she walked in with her hair wet, a bag full of take-out food, and 10 minutes late and there I was. Unfortunately there is no disciplinary action that I can take until she is late 2 times in a pay period. But you better believe I will be checking her time very carefully from now on.

There are many reasons to file and not to file. I have filed more in the last two weeks than my entire nursing career. Right now we have some really bad:( (and I mean really bad) docs (from an agency)coming through our ED. And risk management has told us the only way to get them out is to file incident reports. I have always been against filing them unless the patient has fallen or hurt themself in some way. Or if a really bad medication error has occurred. Let me give you some for instances - would you have file reports on these things. #1 - Drunk patient comes in around midnight after falling off a ladder (approximately 8 feet) and landed on his ribs on a cement wall. Complaining, of course, of rib and side pain. MD goes in to talk to patient - never touches patient. Comes out says "do a xray, but he's okay - just drunk" VS are stable at triage. Pt goes to xray. The RN taking care of the patient just feels something isn't right. In xray - pt has a syncopal episode. BP 94/62 HR 124. 1 1/2 hours later - MD returns to re-eval patient. MD aware of BP and syncopal episode. Discharges pt with diagnose of rib contusion. Nurse asked MD to at least check a H&H. MD says "he's drunk. Let him go home and sleep it off" Nurse does orthostatic VS on discharge. Pt's BP when supine is 96/54 and when standing 74/42. Pt is pale diaphoretic and nauseated. Heart rate is 146. MD still wants to send pt home. Nurse is very, very reluctant to discharge pt. "Luckily," pt becomes unresponsive when transferring to wheelchair. Abd is now rigid - injury is now 3 1/3 hours old. RN initiated IVF wide opened to try to increase blood pressure. MD finally orders H&H - RN asked MD about maybe doing a CT scan of his abd. MD says "no need." RN points out that pt's abd in rigid - and since the MD never touched the patient he didn't know this. So finally orders CT scan. And guess what????? Ruptured spleen - surgery called and pt prepped for OR. So would you have filed an incident report on this MD?? Failure to diagnose and delay in treatment. Luckily no bad outcome - thanks to a great ER nurse. Tell me what you would have done on this. I'll give you another example next time.

Who really cares if someone "higher up" knows what our finger print looks like. In GA, we are fingerprinted when we get our drivers license. But the Pyxis rep was very reassuring about the subject. She wanted everyone to know that their fingerprint would not be sent to the FBI. But apparently she has been asked that question many times. No biggie to me. After having Pyxis at one hospital and then changing jobs to a hospital that still hand counted narcotics every shift - I LOVE THE PYXIS:p

Scrubs and comfortable shoes!!!!

We just went live with the Pyxis on June 25. Haven't ran into any major problems yet. We get to use our birdie finger. So sometimes when the MD really gets on my nerves, I just practice with my scanning finger:devil:

Sorry you are feeling so yucky. All the above advice sounds wonderful. But nothing much helped for me. I didn't have the headache, but I would always wake up feeling nauseous. I probably went for a year feeling like that and finally had to talk to my manager. I got off the night rotation. Do you have to do the two nights every six weeks? I would try talking to your manager. Hopefully, he/she would be understanding. Maybe agree to do an extra w/e shift if possible. Good luck. Hope you get to feeling better:kiss

Kerri212 - All the above advice is great!!! Keep looking and don't get discouraged. As far as your resume is concerned, the nurse recruiter or manager (whoever you happen to interview with) will understand the situation. Just make a point to explain that you have been unhappy and are still actively looking for where you feel like you should be. I have always known that ER was "my thing" But I have interviewed several RN's who were making career changes and looking for their niche. Hired two and have never regretted it. Both are fabulous nurses.

NO problems here. It can be very comforting and a great stress reliever.

Sick, sick man. I think maybe the death penalty would be to easy for this man. Perhaps the order should read Fleets enema TID with a garden hose

Not really sure what the role of a clinical coordinator is. I am a nurse manager in a small ER. Is that just a different title or a whole different position? Either way - good luck!!!

Most snakes might want to be left alone. But in the South some people don't like to leave them alone. We see probably 15-20 snakebites each summer in our ER. Most are uneventful. Observe the patient for a little while, clean the puncture sites, etc. But one patient I will never forget. Mr. B - Mr. B came into triage with a tourniquet around his thumb. It was soooooooo tight his thumb was black. His first words to me - "that d@#$ snake bit me" He had been bit by a rattlesnake that he was trying to get out of the middle of the road (I say leave the snake in the road and let your tires take care of it) Anyway - Mr B's vitals are stable, but he is a little hysterical. So I take him back to a room and go report to the MD. The MD (who isn't from the South nor the country) tells me that there aren't any rattlesnakes in GA and to remove the tourniquet. Well - I just say "yes there are rattlesnakes in GA" and "NO, I don't think you should just jerk that tourniquet off" So he gets a new grad to go remove it. Within 2 minutes of removing the tourniquet guess what happens. Mr. B crashes!!!!!!!!!!! Mr. B's blood pressure bottoms out, heart rate increases to 200, pale, diaphoretic, vomiting, arm all the way up to the elbow is edematous and red, and he keeps saying "please don't let me die. I'm not ready to die" So now the MD has egg on his face and is at a loss of what to do. He calls poison control and talks to the toxicologist who tells him "Yes there are rattlesnakes in GA" and "You really shouldn't have removed that tourniquet that fast" Meanwhile, I get the Crofab (antivenom) out. Mr. B did fine. We stabilized him and gave the Crofab. And giving the antivenom is as scary as the snakebite itself. But that would be a whole different story. So the moral of my snakebite story is "Yes there are rattlesnakes in GA" (and any true GA boy can tell you if that snake is a rattlesnake or not)

Find a mentor, laugh at yourself, and hug your family every chance you get>

RN2007 - I, too, had a DUI prior to starting nursing school. That was over 10 years ago. I have now been a RN for 7 years. I had to write an assay before getting accepted to school. And then again in order to take state boards. And I still list the DUI on every job application I fill out. Someone told me that after 7 years I didn't need to list it anymore. But I figured that it was better to be up front about it. Although it has caused me some embarrassing moments, it has never stopped me from getting into school nor getting a great nursing job. Good luck!!

Our ED is a lot like Cotjockey. We (the nurses) can get the meds out and label them, then the MD must sign the label and hand it to the patient. We will give them enough to last until the pharmacy is opened. If we have to reconstitute antibiotics (especially for peds pt's that you know the parents won't get filled) we will give them the bottle. About a year ago, administration and the hospital pharmacist at the time decided that we would not dispense anything. It was horrible!!!!! So the ED staff pulled together and really became patient advocates. And now we can do as above. So RainbowSky, I agree with Gwenith - we are a powerful voice. And we must all be patient advocates. Get you ED nurses together and protest this decision. Good luck!!!!