txredheadnurse BSN, RN

Treatment, nutritional supplement or medication any change in dosage or frequency should always discontinue the old order. This gets rid of the confusion because, technically, if the old order has not been discontinued then it also needs to be follo...

I was a manager in a LTC for about two years. I and the other nurse manager alternated call every other week. We usually worked our normal 50+ hour week and two sometimes 3 additional shifts a week. It was brutal and I fell asleep in the car on my ...

This November marks my 40th year in nursing. Two thirds of my life. I remember being so thrilled when we were allowed to no longer wear uniform dresses but pantsuits.....yes double knit pantsuits with a flared pointed collar. And when the pantsuit...

The problem with your method is in the popping pills from the blister packs while the packs remain in the drawers. Having audited literally hundreds of med carts for years as part of my job I found more loose pills in the carts where staff popped fr...

I am a "fluffy" person so I already feel the heat plus I must wear pressure hose year round, I am in Texas and I take Synthroid so my heat tolerance is already impaired. So when I was doing audits in SNFs I would be literally soaking wet after an hou...

If I was the manager I would be inclined to say that both the off going and the oncoming shifts would receive write ups for going beyond the allowed report time frame. Maybe a few write ups for miss slow poke will change her style.

I meant to include this also. After a master ordering list is obtained then someone will need to amend the non legend drugs for each resident to reduce quantity etc. I suggest doing this whenever the orders are reconciled on a monthly basis. Start...

To expand on what a PP stated reduce the overall variety of non legend drugs stocked in each facility. By that I mean is it really necessary to have so many different strengths and types of calcium (with and without vitamin D), or multivitamins or G...

This happens when nurses refuse to look past their shift, their list of tasks and take a few minutes to think ahead. When I was doing consulting one of the things I preached and preached was making a good guestimate as to the number of daily doses u...

I want to preface this posting by saying thatI respect CCM & I understand her frustration with the abrupt leaving of her nurse without notice or a face to face. However I myself have twice in my nearly 40 year career left without notice. Both s...

There are other threads on here in the Texas forum giving basically the same info as previous posters have stated above. Hopefully you will be able to stay with your family while job hunting because apartments close to the hospitals tend to be on th...

I once saw a nurse manager pick up a PDR and throw it at a fellow nurse who was "sitting in my chair". She literally knocked the nurse off the chair, calmly walked over and sat down. I was standing there with my mouth hanging open shocked. The nur...

I echo the previous poster. Native Austinite here. We have both a community college and a BSN program here so there are 3 graduating classes every year hitting the hot streets looking for a job. It really behooves anyone with less than 4-5 years o...

I always used awake and reactive to their environment. IMO for the non verbal or lower functional clients this is a more accurate reflection of how they do interact and how the direct care staff tends to judge the clients functionality and mood on a...

I have been in a few different management positions in my 30+ years. I find I tend to fall back on the management lessons I was taught in the Army way back in the day. I mention that because the primary reason for being a military unit is to accomp...

1. Maintain privacy when giving meds....curtain, door shut 2. You can bring everything at once into the room but you need to put the eye drops and inhalers on a barrier of some type (paper towel, tissue, placed into an empty drinking cup if you are ...

Sometimes in order to do the right thing you will find yourself making an enemy. You didn't fail to give the med as ordered the other nurse did. You researched the issue and then took it up your chain of command. Whatever your DON decides to do fr...

I like this solution but the second section the OP quoted mentions labels with specific patient names, prescriber etc. so the individual dose packets wouldn't meet this requirement unless the entire box was labeled which again defeats the purpose of ...

Native Austinite here. If you want to live in the downtown area be prepared for condo living. If you want to live in the central area outside of but next to downtown you will have more choice in the sense of something more than condos. Property is...

There are also several private pay psych hospitals in Austin which are more geared towards the therapeutic involvement of nurses beyond the "pill slinging" lol. Austin State Hospital is not that bad a work environment for a state owned psych hospita...

By DEA regs all Schedule 1-4 drugs must be counted at every shift change and documented and counted per dose. Most states have now moved tramadol into controlled drug status and Lyrica has been a controlled drug since a year or two after it was rele...

"Quota clown" sigh. When will people learn that slinging hate makes the hater look like,dare I say, a clown and ignorant.

Yet these same prejudiced patients will never say a peep if their server or sales associate or repair person is a person of color. For some reason they feel it is OK whenever they are receiving health care to complain. I mean I do know they might s...

Probably have the ADON because otherwise the DON is on call constantly without a break. Plus there are many things that fall onto the DONs lap that floor nurses may be unaware of being her/his responsibility. Having two admin nurses is not a waste ...

In addition to what the previous posters wrote I would suggest since you are basically an independent contractor that you either get a bound journal or make a time & date stamped electronic entry of every transaction you conduct in regards to ord...