jen826

I work on a cardiopulmonary unit in Dayton, OH. Our ratios are 4:1 days and 5:1 nights. We see post heart cath's, MI's, COPD'ers, and everything in between!

Let me start off by saying I'm a very new nurse- graduated in June and started my job in August. So with that being said, I had a patient this week that was admitted for asthma exacerbation. I did my morning assessment on this patient who seemed to be doing okay. I gave my morning meds to this patient (which included Solu-medrol, among others), and went about my day. About 1/2 hour later, I went to check on my patient, and she was increasingly having difficulty breathing, wheezing throughout, and very anxious (which is understandable). So, I look at my patients PRN's, and she had a couple breathing treatments available. I called respiratory and they inform me that they gave her a breathing treatment an hour ago, so she would have to wait until at least 2 hours between treatments. I didn't know what to do at this point. My patient is not necessarily struggling, but very uncomfortable. My preceptor told me to just wait until she was due again for a treatment. I felt like I couldn't do anything to make my patient better. I was stuck in between a rock and a hard spot. I know there are many different reasons to hold the treatment and wait 2 hours, but goodness... I felt like the worst nurse because I couldn't do anything. My hands were tied. This really frustrated me, so I thought I would vent. Thanks!:typing

I'm curious to know this as well. I was in a similar situation as you when I graduated. I passed boards on July, but could not start my new job until August so I worked as a tech. People commented on whether or not I was allowed to do that, but the director of the unit I was a tech on said I was fine.