RNNC2003

Please let me clarify something. I'm not trying to get out of med/surg because it is "hard". I want out because: 1. It's not where I wanted to be in the first place. 2. It's a chaotic learning environment, and I learn better doing something over and over again. With med/surg, you get bombarded with so many different diagnosis, it's hard to remember what's what. Some people enjoy the chaos, I don't. 3. I loved Mother/Baby when I had clinicals there. I also enjoyed GYN med/surg. I guess it's just more interesting to me, which makes it a better learning environment for me. Thanks again for everyone's thoughts. I feel much better now.

Thank you so much everyone! I was starting to feel like if I couldn't cut it in med/surg, then I may not be able to cut it as a nurse, period.

I am a new grad and am not happy with my first job out of school. I picked a med/surg floor because I didn't have any experience (besides what little experience we got during clinicals) and I figured I'd learn a lot. Well, after two months of pure stress, I've decided that I just am not cut out of it. I don't like the total care patients we get on our floor. This is going to sound really stupid, but what other floors could I get experience without having to get the total care, over 80 year old crowd of patients that seem to frequent our floor? I have to stay on my floor for six months before I can transfer out. I wish I would have just gone into Mother/Baby like I wanted. Any suggestions on where to go from here? Maybe GYN med/surg or something more specialized (not a unit though...). Thanks!

Thanks for everyone's responses!! I know most of my questions sound stupid, but I'm new, so I figure asking stupid questions is part of the game. Everyone has been so helpful!!! Thank you!

OK, I'm a new grad and with everything being thrown at me so quickly, I find myself second guessing everything I do, and I mean everything, even the simplest things... Can someone clarify a few things with me? 1. When pushing a med through an IV port (there are fluids running), do I need to flush it through still, even though there are fluids running? 2. When I flush a heplocked IV, it is always so hard to get the flush to flow. If I try to aspirate to see if I get blood return, 99% of the time I don't get it. Then when I try to push the saline through, it's really hard to push through, almost as if it's clogged. So when I push harder, it eventually goes through, but the patient acts like I'm hurting them. What am I doing wrong? 3. If a patient has a stage 1 or 2 pressure sore on their sacral area and a duodern has been applied, how often do we need to change the duodern? Every shift, or prn? 4. We have a lot of elderly patients with some type of dementia/ alzheimers. They have a tendency to go crazy on the midnight shift. If they have something ordered for prn pain, is it OK to give it to them to calm them down? I had one the other day that was in a posey vest restraint, but still somehow managed to throw her legs over the side rails and hang off the side of the bed every 15 minutes. She was totally disoriented and seeing things.... My preceptor said to give her a Darvocet to calm her. (It was listed as a prn pain med). She said it would be OK even though the patient didn't verbalize pain, because a lot of elderly people act out when they're in pain, versus just telling you. Thank you for any help!!

I am a new nurse on a med/surg floor. We give a lot of our meds IV push and I'm having a hard time remembering which ones need to be diluted, which ones need to be pushed slow, etc.... Can anyone list some of the common meds that need to be diluted or pushed slow? I feel so lost trying to remember all these meds on top of trying to learn the new job. Does it ever get any better??