Krojas21

I also used tha patch for about 2 1/2 years, all the way through nursing school and I just took it off this January because we want to try and get pregnant again :). I loved it for the most part. All was fine for the first 5 months then I'd get sick (nausea and vomiting) the day after I put the first week patch on (only for about 6 hours or so). It was so bad that I had to move my patch day so I wasn't getting sick at school (mondays) and instead on my day off (sunday). This went away around a year of use and I only felt quesy but never threw up anymore. I also had irratation at the site d/t the adhesive but it wasn't extreme. I loved to wear mine on my upper back out of site and didn't rub off like it did when I tried to put it on my low back or abd. Compared to the pills this was the best invention in the world. However, after having 1-2 more kids, I think I'll try the nuva ring next. My new obgyn didn;t seem to recommend the patch and drilled my on it when I became her patient, and suggested that after I have another baby that I should consider the nuva ring. I have heard the bad rap about the patch, and seen many patients who miscarried while on it, but that's probably from incorrect usage. As far as blood clots are concerned I don't smoke so I'm at lower risk and never had a probalem with it. My sister-in-law had those horrible headaches someone else talked about, and her md made her stop taking them, nows she's using the IUD. I don't reccomend any of them in particular since that would be giving medical advice, just find what works best for you and discuss it with your doctor. Good luck.

I only heard of the cartilage part once from a salon person. I think she meant that since babies don't have very firm cartilage in the ears for the first few months that piercing in the wrong spot would be bad if they accidently pierced too high and the cartilage grew around the earing. I think she meant it was best to wait until it had really formed/hardened as to not mess up.

First off let me please state that I'm not posting this to start a debate. I was just wondering if there is any medical thoughts out there as to how early is too early to pierce an infants ears. Again please don't make this a debate. I have seen babies less than 5 days old with pierced ears. Is there any medical reason to wait until a certain age. I have heard from one salon that parents should wait until at least x amount of time so that the cartilage can form first. Besides saftey (possible swallowing or tearing), infection and alergic reation to the metal are they any concerns about piercing a babies ears in the first few months of life? Plus if any of you work in ped clinics do the Docs pierce the ears of infants if the parent wants? Who supplys the baby safe studs (with screw on backs) if they will (the parent or the doc)? I have seen infants earings with screw on backs in catalogs but I don't they are for starting the whole (pointed). If the docs do them how are they done (stud gun or needle)? Thanks in advance. PS Please don't start a debate on wheather parents even should. I only want more non judgmental info, thanks.

Our L&D usually bring pt to the pp side around 1 hour for lady partsl deliveries and two hours for c-sections. If unstable (pp hemm, on mag...) they stay until stable. They always have IV's in (unless they never had one in the first place), but haven't always been up to bathroom yet. I leave IV SL until about 12 hours or they at least prove that they can drink, pee, not nauseated and aren't bleeding excessively. I'm a pp only RN so I don't mind that they haven't been up yet to pee yet, it's a good teaching time and way to see their bottom, bleeding and get family out of room for a while, so we can talk about their wishes (want to rest, family to leave, plan of care...).

We have OB techs which can be or don't have to be cna's also. They are allowed to do pku's and other specimen collection (ie urine catch), it's in their list of allowed responsibilites, but I haven't seen any of them do one. Us RN's are pretty protective of our babies and tend to do stuff by ourselves. Since I'm on nights we really underutilize our ob techs at night, we tend to figure "well I have to go in and assess my patient anyway why bother let the ob techs do VS, since I'll be there anyway." I try to give them things to do but mostly they sit and answer call light and the phones. ~kim

I'm sorry about your experience but I also don't believe that it was a pku since you must have food (breastmilk or formula) in them before the test is done, but maybe some other type of test (maybe a NICU nurse would know about.) I haven't seen other types but your probably in a different state maybe they have some other type of test. Do you remember seening them warm the baby's foot? If it was a lab tech draw they don't often do babies draws at our hospitals and when they do (usually only for a float nurse who doens't know how) they make a mess and baby is screaming. We try to offer to do it for other nurses if they feel uncomfortable. And the gravity idea does work the best. We warm the foot but running hot water in a diaper or putting a hot wet washcloth in a zip lock bag then putting it on the foot. Again sorry for your bad experience.

For venipuncture: In my senior preceptorship we would use a regular need with hub (23-25G, I think) enter the vein in the back of the hand by bending their wrist and our own had was the tournoquet. We used glass pipettes in the hub then blotted the circles on the pku test paper. Where I work now the nurses that do do venipunture just use a safety needle (I think 23 G) (but they break off the safety part because it gets in the way) and lets the blood flow out of the hub and catch it on the test paper. If you use a butterfly needle and syringe, do you have to draw back very slowly so as to not collapse the vein or injure the area? I haven't done blood draws besides a bili and that was a heelstick. Thanks for any info.

I was just wondering how many of you are still doing heelsticks or venipuncture for newborn pkus. I hear that venipunture is the way to go now since it's less painfull and supossedley faster. I have done both and don't mind either way. At my current work very few nurses are actually doing venipunture, but the push is toward venipunture. When I was doing my senior precetorship at a different hospital all we did were venipuncture unless we couldn't get it after 2 attempts then we went to a heelstick. Also what size needle are you using? Whats the minimum size that can be used? Are you using pipettes or letting it flow? Are you using regular needles/with hub or breaking off the saftey devise? I just thought this would make an interesting thread. I didn't see anything similar to this posted yet but ft it has sorry. ~Kim

I work in a highrisk family birth center (FBC) that is seperate from L&D and our hospital has a NICU. We have variety of different RN jobs (ie Nursery lead, Transistion, Mother/baby nurses, and antepartum nurses). I'm new so I only do mother/baby right now, but I hope to train into transistion, tehn lead nursery and someday antepartum also. L&D is seperate so that would be many years down the road for me since I want to be trained in everything on the family birth side first. Our lead nursery nurse may take a load of babies with problems or requiring interventions (temp instability, IV meds, bililight babies, sepsis, drug withdrawl babies, comfort care only babies...ect.) or help out with newly born infants when the arrive on our side Tansistion nurse attends deliveries in l&D and cares for baby only then when mom and baby are transfered to our side (FBC) then continue to care for baby until baby is past transition then the postpartum nurses takes over for baby in addition to mom. If there are no babies being delivered then the transistion nurses takes a load of babies or helps out in thte nursery. If there are any risk factors in L&D a NICU nurse attends the delivery instead of our transistion nurse. L&D nurses (on the other side) only take care of mom and fetus, until stable (about 1-2 hours). Antepartum nurses take care of moms and fetuses in utero, and may also take on mothers and babies. Floor nurses take care of a mixture of patients- moms only (baby in NICU), moms and babies (couplets), and gyn patients. I work nights so our nursery can care for babies in the nursery, we promote rooming in but our population of patients (innercity) usually send babies to the nursery at night at least for a few hours. During the day babies are only in the nursery for interventions or occassional assessments, weights ect. We encourage moms to care for their baby during the day not make us feed and change and care for baby in the nursery. I love working with all patients so I think it's great to be able to do it all.

I would also like to put my two cents in, I am also a younger new grad (25) and I haven't seen this at all, however (and I apologize if this has been already said, I haven't read all the posts) We as nurses, nursing students or whatever have the responsibility to go up the chain of command and voice our concerns. Most of the examples from the first few posts are horrendous and need to be dealt with. State nursing boards need to be notified and school instuctors. I am so proud to be a new young nurse and I would never think about doing anything that doesn't put my patient first and is unproffessional. Especially the drug use and playing jokes on family or patients. I say shame on all who don't speak up and take action. Sorry if any of this has already been said.

You can take the NCLEX the day after graduation if the testing center is open. For example I graduated on a friday and one person in my class did take it on saturday (the day of our pinning, but I think the center was closed on Sunday), but I waited until Tuesday and did fine. You don't want to wait too long or you get out of nursing mode and things aren't as fresh in your mind. Hasn't your state board come to talk to you yet? If not then ask when they will, because they give you all the details for your state. Hang in there. :wink2: ~kim

Are you breast feeding? That may be why your MD is pushing something that can be progesterone only. So it won't diminish your milk supply, if not then who knows why she's pushing that choice other than becuase she's promoting it. By the way: I use the Patch and love it. I had nausea for six hours after puting on a new patch (just the first of each new moths supply) for a couple of months but now every thing is great, and very convienent. It's your choice what you use, look into all of them and make an informed choice based on what you want not someone else.

Possibly after you aspirated, you may have then pushed the needle into deep and did hit a vessel, while injecting , thus seeing a flush of blood. Did you stabalize the syringe well while injecting? I don't know what the consequenses of the Rhogam going into a vessel are, but you could ask the pharmacist. I also think that your instructor should know about it right away, did you say anything to the RN you were working with after it happened?

Thank you alot for clearing things up for me. I am most likely going to attend a community college for 2 years and then a University for 2 years. So do you think a BSN would be better? Also when I've been looking at the college courses most colleges offer, they usually only have RN listed, but since you said diploma, BSN, and ADN are all included to get your RN, does that mean they still offer the BSN? does that mean they still offer the BSN? I don't think she understands that RN (registered nurse) is a license that you get from the state you live in after you finish school. How you finish school doesn't matter (it can be community college, university or a diploma program offered by some hospital) all will give you the RN license if you pass the state boards. Community colleges don't offer BSN degrees, only universities. Community colleges offer only ADN degrees. The order of degrees is: Diploma (not a degree)-hospital based(varies how long)...will give RN ADN (associates degree in Nursing)-community college(2 year)...will give RN BSN (bachelors of science in Nursing)- university (4year)...Will give RN MSN (masters of science in Nursing) -university(after BSN varies about 2+ years), need bachelors 1st, can get you to be a certified nurse midwife (CNM) or nurse practitioner Does that help? I remember when I graduated I couldn't understand the degree system either. It took me a while to figure it out, so I can relate.

Thanks everyone! You have all help me those are some great sites. Just to let you all know I was interested because in my Nursing theory class we had an assingment that talked about a direct entry (lay) midwife and I had never heard the term used before. I knew about CNM, and I didn't realize that there were other forms of midwives. Thanks for all your imput.