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Soundofmusic, You put that so well, all management needs to read this. This is the problem with nursing everywhere. They have unrealistic expectations that we can never live up to because it is physically impossible, yet we run ourselves ragged trying and end up feeling like failures because we can almost never be successful. I for one would never, evergo back to the bedside in a million years, you couldn't pay me enough.

I started in home health almost a year ago. For me it has been a catch22. I love the flexibility,hate the hours and hours of paperwork that I bring home everyday and really hate the low pay. But, it works with my lifestyle, my husband isn't military but travels alot for work and I am solely responsable for the kids when he is gone. If I need to drive my son somewhere in the middle of the day for some reason, I can. It also depends on the agency. Mine is very family and nuirse friendly. My friend works for an agency where that is not the case.

Congrats on landing a job in these tough times. I have worked for (and did my clinical at) both of the health systems that each of these hospitals are a part of. I generally found the health system that starts with an S better than the other major one in our area that starts with an M. The M one seems to use nurses like work horses and burn them out. Nurse to pt ratios are worse than the other system. Again this has just been my experience. It all depends on your manager and the floor you are on. One thing I do like better about system M is the computer system. It is more like a windows system which I prefer and system S seems more like MAC. Good luck making your decision.

Recently I tried to straight cath an obese woman for ua/c&s and was unable to. I just gave the live-in a sterile cup and a peri wipe especially for clean catches and told her to do her best and call me when she got the sample. It came up negative so it was good enough.

If you can tough it out for a year it will look better on your resume and you will def be prepared for home health.

haha. it sounds stupid to me too but somewhere on one of these threads where the subject came up, someone proved that "orientate" was actually a legit word and not just someone pronouncing it wrong.

Me too. Im glad she got her license back but will she ever really want to work as a nurse again? I wouldn't.

I am full time. I do 6 visits/day & I make a little over $200/day. The per diem RN, doing the same 6 visits would make $50/visit = $300/day. But, I get PTO and I get the same if I do 4 visits or 7 so I think it all works out in the end.

That is good for a new grad. Unfortunately, you will never get rich doing HHN (or any other kind of nsg) but it is my favorite kind of nursing so far.

Up until recently, I thought I had a stellar relationship with my coworkers but it seems that they are all a bunch of backstabbers after all. I am disappointed but I still need the job and so I carry on. It disgusts me and I wish that I worked with all male coworkers. I dont think I would have the same problems. Just remember, if someone is talking badly about someone else, chances are they are doing the same to you, just not when you are around.

Eeow, Does that happen often? I would have to jump off the table and slap him, or if I was the nurse, a knee to the groin would be in order. That is so obnoxious.

Just a quick poop story... I was transfering a pt from toilet to wheelchair after they had a bm when my worst nightmare came true. They started to fall and I had no choice but to lower them to the floor using my leg which I had no choice but to strategically place between their dirty but crack to lower them down. It was either that or grab their upper body and squeeze but they would have definitly been hurt. I was quite traumatized by the whole thing and still had to fill out an incident report.

I did it one summer and the worst was one day a girl went into a severe asthma attack and had to take an ambulance ride to the hospital. The other major injury was a boy who broke his arm playing football or soemthing. Otherwise, lots of sore throats, lots of mini neb tx, headaches from not drinking enough in hot weather, mosquito bites, one ghonorhea of the throat (yup), a small lice epidemic in one bunk, tons of meds to give out, a yeast infection, a growth hormone shot, an infected ingrown toenail and other minor random stuff. We were lucky to have a parent/pediatrician on call at all times in the camp.

I did an LPN program full time when my 1st one was an infant. I dont recommend it. I started doing prereqs for RN/ADN program when my little guy was 3 and in preschool. I would run to class for the 3 hours while he was there and then run back to get him. It just worked out that by the time they were both in school FT, I was ready to start the program. You might want to look into getting your BSN and just taking classes slowly 1 or 2 at a time. The ADN program is really hard and fast. Only you know what you are capable of and how bad you want it. I personally would be setting myself up to fail if I tried it with 3 little ones. It is not just the class time you will be away. You will be mentally absent too. Devoted to your studying, care plans and papers, unable to cook or clean very much. It puts alot of stress on your family and marriage.

I just started in HH a few months ago and I am loving it. I just started case managing a case in which the pt is a 62 yo, lives alone in a 2nd story walk-up apartment and just had the whipple procedure done for pancreatic ca. He will be going for chemo when his incision heals. I plan on talking to the oncologist and my manager about this but isn't that going to be kind of rough getting home after tx? I know the prognosis for pancreatic ca is not good but does this procedure improve it dramatically? I am wondering if I should be concerned about his living situation. Should I get SW involved? Try to nudge him towards moving someplace more accessible in his compromised position? I dont know how much family support he has if any.

Haha. This alone doesn't make someone a bad person or nurse. Sometimes I have a little bout of narcolepsy in the afternoon while charting. I chart on computers and sometimes I doze off for a minute and it looks like thissssssssssssss#$^&*(KKK LOL Of course I can fix it before saving it. I am so afraid someone will think I am a drug addict or something. Does this happen to anyone else?

I have worked in both med/surg and acute rehab. You use alot of the same skills. Last week in acute rehab I was monitoring a heparin drip, drawing type&cross and hanging prbc and ffp. You do have to have skills in all settings. I dont know why rehab gets such a bad rap.

thanks for the link. this is what i have been trying to tell people. these types of technical schools have thrived during this recession for these reasons. they admit anyone as long as they will get paid. most of the clinical time is just on paper. attendence records, grades and anything else is fudged so that they don't have to expel anyone and lose their money.

What? Nursing staff responsible for laundry? What kind of low budget operation is this?

Thanks Tewdles, Examining my feelings about death is easy, I know it makes me extremely sad, keeping it seperate is the hard part. I know how much I miss my own mom, and she was older. I cant imagine losing her when I was young and still so dependent on her. There is so much for her to teach them, so much unfinished business, that it just kills me. I could cry just thinking about it. I am so bad at keeping my feelings in check when it comes to grief. I guess I just need to turn the focus to the pt and forget my own experiences. Easier said than done.

Hello hospice nurses. I am wondering if you could give me some practical advice. I am new to home care and in my previous work settings I did not have too much experience with death and dying. In LTC when somebody died, it was OK because they were ready to. I find myself having a really hard time dealing with young people with families that are dying. So hard that I am at a loss for words, not being therapeutic, kind of like a dear in headlites when they obviously are looking for support from me. I mostly care for basically stable, healthy people that are just recuperating from a hospital stay. I have one pt that is in her 40s and has kids the same age as mine and is dying of brain ca w/mets to everywhere. I get so sad just walking into her house, I sometimes have to choke back tears or think about baseball. She is not a hospice pt but she is clearly coming to the begining of the end. How do I separate myself and be therapeutic for her. I get so squeamish when she starts talking about dying and I am just awkwardly silent. What can I say or do? Any ideas?

I just started as a hh nurse ft and I work at the hospital 1day/week or so. I will stay there because I would miss it if I left but dont want to do it ft.

That is not only stupid but could be criminal. Maybe criminally stupid! What nursing school did he go to? That is sexual assault of a patient.

Yeah and then you proceed to throw it back in the fridge and order a pizza because you are way too busy to cook.

If you did as good as you say for all tests but the final, it sounds like you may have test anxiety. When you are overcome with anxiety you cannot think straight. Talk to your doctor about this problem.