green12 BSN, RN

green12 is a BSN, RN and specializes in psych.

Latest Activity

1. Activities for mental illness in a psychiatric institution

   green12 replied to ritaPHIL's topic in Psychiatric

   We have had success on my adult inpt psych unit with Bingo, Pictionary (free-for-all style, the patients are more supportive of each other and no one feels like a loser), and Catchphrase. People of varying levels of physical and cognitive functionin...

2. Haldol and cogentin IM

   green12 replied to New2ER's topic in Psychiatric

   JulesA- I can think of quite a few reasons but the first that comes to mind is that you don't want someone having EPS/dystonia in the midst of their behavioral crisis, they don't always calm down as quickly as we would like. I recently had a patient...

3. Insomnia meds for psych patients?

   green12 replied to medsurgrnco's topic in Psychiatric

   don't forget about seroquel. we give out anything and everything for sleep. how well it works and what type of med we give depends on the person. seroquel, lunesta, ambien, trazodone, benadryl, vistaril, temazepam, mirtazepine, risperdal, haldol, ...

4. Is there a future in Psych Nursing?

   green12 replied to rookie_rn's topic in Psychiatric

   The other folks here are correct in pointing out that psych illnesses aren't going anywhere and therefore neither is a career in psych. I know I'm staying in psych for my career in nursing and have also wondered what I can do when I'm tired of inpat...

5. Got slapped by pt. Staff splitting. Need feedback.

   green12 replied to wonderbee's topic in Psychiatric

   I'm dealing with a similar situation now. I was in charge today and one of the patients on our locked sub-ward (3 bed unit within a locked unit- does anyone else have this btw?) flipped out when a certain staff was in there. She threatened assault bu...

6. how do you manage a patient who has delusions

   green12 replied to ritaPHIL's topic in Psychiatric

   Also, sometimes delusions overlap with reality so be sure to listen carefully to what the patient is saying. I had a patient with religious delusions and on Easter sunday he asked me what Easter meant to me. I gave him a very brief non-religious an...

7. working with little staff--suggestions?

   green12 replied to aloevera's topic in Psychiatric

   Try your state board of nursing for some direction, or how about starting a union? Contact regulating agencies like OSHA, JHACO, etc. It's a lot of work but hospitals pick up their act quick when JHACO comes around, the state investigates complaint...

8. How does a psych career affect the psych nurses?

   green12 replied to malusport's topic in Psychiatric

   I've been in psych for 2 years and I've found that I'm hypervigilant about loud noises. On the unit we all are, from housekeeping to social workers ("shh, did you hear that, did it sound like a bang?"- very useful response) but I'm annoyed that I'm l...

9. Where Do They Go?

   green12 replied to handyrn's topic in Psychiatric

   We have everything that elkpark mentioned except for nursing homes. I've seen a person or two sent to a nursing home but they have been ruled out for psych problems and are more likely organic (ie dementia). We more often send people to group homes o...

10. do you talk about work?

    green12 replied to green12's topic in Psychiatric

    Thanks for all the replies, I'm working on finding a happy medium, it was too hard to not talk about work at all so I'm mostly focusing on cutting down. Are there any threads about bizarre psych patient stories? Your patients can really feed the e...

11. Losing your skills in psych?

    green12 replied to Jedi of Zen's topic in Psychiatric

    I agree batgirl23- thanks for your 2 cents. Also, many of the patients at our facility don't have outpatient medical care and when they get to us they unload every discomfort/medical problem they can think of and some they haven't thought of yet. T...

12. do you talk about work?

    green12 posted a topic in Psychiatric

    Wondering what your thoughts and experiences are... My husband thinks I bring work home with me and doesn't want to hear about it (at all)... I think I'm just talking about work (inpatient psych) and it happens to be pretty strange/stressful/tragic/...

13. Phobias anyone???

    green12 replied to danissa's topic in Psychiatric

    Balloons set my skin to crawling and make me cry. The popping and squeaking is what really bothers me but just the sight of a balloon is enough. I don't know why everyone thinks it's so funny when I react this way!

14. Management of the med window

    green12 replied to wonderbee's topic in Psychiatric

    Our nurses all have their own style in the med room, and I have developed mine over time. If it's the am med pass I'll wake up the stragglers with my most annoying cheerful persistant attitude because I think they should be getting out of bed for tx...

15. new job, mistakes

    green12 replied to cherilee's topic in Psychiatric

    And sometimes there's a bright side to the mistakes... like a patient who got a few too many Thorazines (long story), she thought we were trying to kill her but at least she finally stopped screaming and fell asleep. I think I was fortunate to make...