TCJan

I work with Medical Techs in a Hospital. I think the Board of Nursing across our nation is either being very non protective of the patients lives or they are being paid off to look the other way! I went to school for 12 months to obtain my LPN. We had 3 months of Pharmacology. WE were trained on the units with instructor supervision as well, in regards to medications. Most hospitals I began working in after graduating, also had me as a LPN go through their pharmacology class. Experience also teaches if you want to learn more. I am amazed that we are standing by watching the healthcare system go down the tubes. Nurses need to speak out about these practices that are being done by for profit facilities or we will soon be out of jobs, by people they can hire off the street and teach what we know in 3 days. Report these facilities to your board of nurses if you want job security. Healthcare has developed into a heirarchy with CEO nurses making the big bucks and the CNA's doing the work of licenced nurses......It's coming and you better speak out now or forever hold your peace when all the jobs are gone!

Question....I am a LPN, have been for many moons. I had a male patient who takes scheduled Methadone 50mg q.12hrs. He also has Percocet 5/235 and Motrin ordered, q 4hrs. As a new nurse on the unit, the guy asks me a half hour after I gave him his Methadone for a Percocet. I noticed that he was sitting in his chair bobbing his head in a stupor high soon after gving him his methadone, when he came to ask me for a Percocet. I have run across this before and have always called the doctor about it before giving it as long as I have an order to give it that closely,I'm covered, but I"m not going to do it if the order just reads q 4hrs. and the patient figures well I can get really high now if I take them together. I see this only in male patients with male doctors too, never would a male doctor give a woman all the drugs they want. Am I wrong in practicing nursing this way? Also, this is a nursing home and they have med/tech's giving the meds at times, not all the time I guess. Even the med/tech understood what I was questioning , she said he asks her for it too but she gives him tylenol, But, my preceptor that day wrote me up for what she said , he went and asked her if she would give it and she blamed me for not giving it and wrote me up for causing mental angish to the patient. She was also a nurse of 25yrs who was helping me give my am insulins and started to draw up Lantus(which is rarely given in the day time, couldn't figure that one out either) and Humolog in the same syringe, I stopped her and said, you can't mix those, she said well their clear to clear.....I said yes they are but they can't be mixed, it says so in the Drug Book, she said, well they never taught us that in school. I asked when she was trained and then told her Lantus has only been out for around 6 years I think. She said,well I"ve been doing it for long time and no one has died! Then, she at the end of the day after I spoke with NP who came in about this patients pain meds , she got nervous, the NP says well the guy just asked me to prescribe him a beer with his meals and cuz he is on Methadone, I said no, but she had seen many patients be on all kinds of narcotics at once, I said, yah if they are on Hospice or have cancer, but this guy is a amputee. She said call the pain med doctor he is the one prescribing for him. I then turned around and saw this incident report that the preceptor had written me up on.....and I was in shock, I gave it to the NP and told her I can't believe this nurse writing me up on trying to do the right thing. She couldn't either. Near the end of the shift I told the preceptor and the scheduler that I was not coming back.....they didn't care. They are doing so many things wrong in that facility it would take a month to write all of it up. I think this nursing profession has gotten so corrupt that its hard for us who were raised in ethics and professionalism and morals to figure out how to function in such frustration and dysfunction anymore. And yes its us ole timers who get bullied and ganged up by slip shod greedy DON's and Adminstrators and their followers..........why don't we bombard our congressman and State Boards to clean this profession up for the health and safety of the patients????

Well what's this then? I'm 63yrs. old, LPN. I had to call a doctor for a lady in minor chest pain, a 25yr. R.N. with tatoos all over her body was in charge. She asked me if the patient was diaphoretic? And I said no , but I will check her again, I did and by the time I came back to the desk the doctor had called and she took the M.D.'s orders, and then proceded to call me these names. "you freakin stupid b...h." "Don't you ever call the doctor and leave the desk before he calls back". "Your p...in me off , just don't p...s me off." I said nothing back to her. Then she has to give my patient an IV push and she got nasty with him and he called his parents to come and get him and take him home. I had to PR that situation. I told the supervisor about these incidences and nothing was done. Then I had to work with her again and I was told I had to have 6 patients plus do all my 4 hr vitals and accuchecks and am I & O's. I went to another units telephone to call my supervisor, the same one, and he then called the aide to tell her to help me, (she's 18, lives with her boyfriend and goes to Mediao places and wants to be a RN! ). She was mad about it and slamed the charts down on the desks that I had lined up in front of me after she charted them! I said nothing. Then on my why out to the parking lot, the supervisor told me that those two staff members said I had called the aide a B....h, in front of a patient becuz she wouldn't help me with the vital signs. Which I did not. I asked him to go ask the patient , he did and the patient said I had said no such thing. My boss knew that I hadn't also. But H.R., believed their lies and suspended me one day before my six month bonus was due and then they fired me,(no fault firing)! I was to work there for 2 yrs, and I am 2300 miles from my home state.! Why would H.R. also young, believe that? Do you think its age discrimination? And could what she said to me be called "a hostile enviroment".. I said nothing to her about her tatoos, that she talked about all night! And her my space website where she is dressed in black and giving people the finger!!!!! And if a person is a Wicha Witch, is that discrimination against their religion? I didn't say anything about that either. I was wearing my cross that night tho. I think we are working in some really bad times......people have changed, I never talked that way to an older nurse when I was their age and I have never worked with anyone who was so liberal and radical in this profession either. Hence, I am glad I'm gone but I just wondered if I should get the EEOC to investigate that situation? Any comments good or bad would help me to understand this better. Thank-you

What is the Metz test your talking about? And when is a fetus's nervous system developed? Well I just went into the internet and found an article on it...so here it is......... [ Carolyn's Home Page ] [ Main Abortion Page ] [ Guestbook] [ E-Mail ] Summary of a presentation given by Dr. Paul Ranalli on "Pain, Fetal Development, and Partial-birth abortion" on June 27, 1997. (I personally attended this presentation). Related links are included below. The fetus can feel pain at 20 weeks. This is probably a conservatively late estimate, but it is scientifically solid. Elements of the pain-conveying system (spino-thalamic system) begin to be assembled at 7 weeks; enough development has occurred by 12-14 weeks that some pain perception is likely, and continues to build through the second trimester. By 20 weeks, the spino- thalamic system is fully established and connected. There are three different indicators providing evidence that the fetus feels pain. Anatomical - pain receptors spread over the body in stages: 8-16 weeks - pain impulse connections in the spinal cord link up and reach the thalamus (the brain's reception center): 7-20 weeks (summarized by Anand, K.J.S., Atlanta) Physiological/Hormonal - fetuses withdraw from painful stimulation - two types of stress hormones, normally released by adults subjected to pain, are released by adults subjected to pain, are releases in massive amounts by the fetus subjected to a needle puncture to draw a blood sample: (a) from 19 weeks onward (N. Fisk; London, England) (b) from 16 weeks onward (J. Partch; Kiel, Germany) Behavioral - withdraw from pain - change in vital signs A 20-30 week old fetus actually will feel more pain than an adult. The period between 20-30 weeks is a uniquely vulnerable time, since the pain system is fully established, yet the higher level pain-modifying system has barely begun to develop. Below is a graphical represenation depicting this mis-match in pain detection and pain modification Dr. Paul Ranalli is a neurologist at the University of Toronto and acting president of the de Veber Institute for Bioethics and Social Research. He is also Vice-President of Canadian Physicians For Life Additional Information Unborn Pain Franics X. Rocca @ The American Spectator Babies may feel pain of abortion Roger Highfield @ Electronic Telegraph Pain and It's Effects In the Human Neonate and Fetus - from the New England Journal of Medicine. Vol. 317 No 21 (19 Nov. 1987): Pages 1321-1329. Foetus 'may feel pain as early as six week old' Abortion doctors may give foetuses painkiller In testimony before the House Constitution Subcommittee, Professor Robert White confirmed that the 'fetus within this time frame of gestation, 20 weeks and beyond, is fully capable of experiencing pain.... Without question, all of this is a dreadfully painful experience for any infant subjected to such a surgical procedure." -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- [ Carolyn's Home Page ] [ Main Abortion Page ] [ E-Mail ]

I know exactly what you mean......in a nursing home I worked in, we had no pill crushers.......maintence was to buy us some "pliers", mind you to cruch pills with.....they were too cheap to buy regular pill crushers..(that nursing home is owned by a doctor and he has 120 of them and wants each one to make $5million in profit!).they bought some, and they had the groves on them which were tearing into the paper cups.......so due to rules and regs they had to be ground down by maintence, so they were smooth and wouldn't get pill contents on the pliers. So, I drop them off to them, 3 of them are playing a dart game and their dinner is cooking on a outdoor grill inside the building!!!!!!!! Fire hazard I'd say. so I go back in an hour to pick them up..one side of the plier was smooth and one wasn't.......the guy was gone.....so I thought ....I've got to pass my meds, I can't wait for these jokers, I turn the machine on to grind them down, which I have never done before.....and in walks the maintence superivisor. I told him the scenrio and he ground them down. Now, these had been dropped off to them a week ago. Why should nurses have to do these things. Then, one night I'm at the desk charting and the maintence guy come over and says.....tell your CNA to clean up the urine on the floor in the TV room that some patient peed on, because I don't do any clean ups of bodily fluids!!!!!!!! In that same facility, maintence shuts the lights off at 7"40pm.....we pass meds til 9pm.....the only night lights that are on are near the clean and dirty linen closets, if you move the cart over there to see your med mar., evariably a CNA will have to get into it and yah have to move the cart and get out of her way , yah know what I mean.......I told the DON/ADON/Administrator........do you think they ever did anything about it ..........no. All three maintence guys were standing around my cart after I had complained about it.....at the exact time the lighs went off, and I was so busy, I didn't get a break til 8"45pm that night.....no break , no dinner.......and so when the lights went out, I said, how do you expect me to see.....the one said , buy a mining helmet with a light on it, and the other said, buy one of those reading lights and clamp it on your med book.....yah know I laughed alittle, but........I quit the next doy too........Guess, what folks........I wish I hadn't but......who really cares about the seriousness of our jobS????? No one but us I guess. And , I think this whole business and economy is about making more money for the "owners/shareholders" whoever they are and in order for them to make those huge profits, they have to work their employees to death almost......they know it......they want production out of us......they want one person to do the job of what 3 or 4 people used to do........It saves them overhead, don't you get it?????WE' the working class are getting our As......kicked big time......and we are damn slaves in this feudal system,......when are we going to learn.........Us nurses need to start buying up these nursing homes ourselves and maybe a few hospitals...why let the doctors have all the profit....lets hire them or a few PA's. or a NP......because that's the only way we can practice our profession the way it should be done and that's the only way the patients will get the care they need and should get and are paying for...........WE need to start a national organization a national union if yah will......Electricians have done.it with the IBEW....if people wanted the work done right, they hired a union man, and it had to be done by a union man in order for the state inspectors to approve it as done correct. Only the "scabs" done slip shod work and they worked for less too. If these places want union nurses, then they hire us at what we tell them we will work for, and we will TELL them how many staff we need to get the work done......if they want to hire "scabs", and I"ve already worked with alot of them, who don't follow the rules and regs only when state is there....and then that hospital or nursing home will get the reputation of hiring non union or non association whatever and all the patients will go to the facilities owned and employed by topnotch nurses and they will know its well staffed and they will know they will get the best care. All the nurses will be cooperative owners of these facilities........and will receive a bonus, but there will be no greed, no envy, they will work as a team to make sure every patient is cared for and feels safe before the lights go out at night. Nurses don't become DON's and ADON's if they haven't worked the unit...they don't get those positons by walking into it.....and once they walk into it they don't make rounds again on the unit and just sit in their offices, but they are interactive with the nurses and the patients and pitch in........The CNA's, tidy up the rooms every night......they won't throw the dirty poopy linen on the floors.......because in this nursing home......or hospital the linen cart will be moved into the room and it will be placed in the cart,not on the floor.........and yes housekeeping will clean up the messes, and they will empty the trash cans every night in the dirty linen room and they won't place the only large trash cans in the place next to the nurses station, for dressings to be tossed into, and food, and papers and whatever else........but they will go into a trash closet.......and nurses will have a larger med room than the supply room........and they will have room to hang their coats and a locker room on every unit........most hospitals have that for nurses, but nursing homes don't....and nurse aides will pass ice water every shift before meds are passed and every patient will be encouraged to drink water every day .....these are all things I have had to do as a nurse.........nothing is delegated anymore , they expect us to do it ALL...........well don't, your only assisting a millioinaire to make more millions.........and if yoiu work like that for very long , the workforce will be dead before they can retire and draw social security.........maybe they know that and are thinking that that is part of the plan for your generation.......poplulation and fiscal control folks that all it is.....and until we do something about it as a group of workers, nothing will change........because every "thread" , I've read on this site I can usually relate to....its happening all over this country......and believe me, IT NEVER USED TO BE THIS WAY !!!!! I've watched it change drasticly over the past 20 yrs...........It's up to us to do something about it...I don't have the expertise to start a National organization of Nurses..., but maybe some one does......and just look at all the nurses we could sign up into something like that just from this website.........and by the way......we should own all the nursing agencies too....why should some rich man own it as an investment project.....nurses should hire nurses..........and we should also demand the state inspectors to be inspecting FOR criteria set by nurses who work there....If the facilities and hospitals really worried about patient care.....why do they not want the state inspectors talking to us about what we know, should, be changed and corrected in order for us to give good nursing care.........they just play games with the administration and then administration plays games with us, hide this , hide that, don't talk to them, keep your mouth shut.......I feel like a dang crook , its awfull........now days. I have to work to eat, I have to have cash flow, but they sure try to dupe us nurses in this system , the way it is now. I went into nursing because I was a honest , trustworthy, helping person, I always loved my work and was proud of it.......but somewhere along the line here....I feel I'm working for a dang casino or something.....patients are being taken and so are we nurses.....while the other guy has hit the jackpot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Go to Link: Ultimate LPN NCLEX Study Guide http://[email protected] cost $89.00 don't know anything about it, but saw the ad one day and thought I'd try to let the nurses at "all nurses" know Hope it helps.........

Whats the Regs. for LPN's flushing Picc Lines, with 3cc of 100u/cc of Heparin. These Rehab. units in nursing homes are admitting high acuity pts. from hospitals and expecting LPN's to care for their Picc lines for IV ATB therapy. I thought we couldn't give Heparin IV. When I worked on sub-acute unit in a hospital, we had a IV course and we could flush with a pre-mixed 3% sol.of Hepariin/NS. , but usually the R.N.'s cared for the Picc lines and we cared for the pheripheral lines. Anyone know the answer.??????

I beleive that our government(authority) made abortion an OK thing, in order for population control. In the meantime, 1.5 million babies are aborted every year for the past 30 years. All because of one atheist, Roe vs Wade, who became a born again christian later in her life. The problem with the government OK'ing abortion is that for a person who has no knowledge of God, the government ruling overrides their conscience .........that is wrong......and it is very wrong for a government to dehumanize their people to animals, their woman to mere sex objects, and motherhood to a choice. Woman have become "duped" by male domination of our society, in probably the most hurtful way a man could do , by killing his off spring. It makes no sense . While those same males and duped woman detest the killing of Whales and raise their flags and wear their pins"Save the Whales"....and in this country of USA.....its $1000.00 fine for destroying an eagles egg. It makes no sense. .I have a judgement day coming and I don't want to be a part of what my conscience says is wrong. I voice my opinion now that I"m older.......because I do not want to be an accomplise to their atrocities.........there is a doctor who has written a book about the fact that he performed over 60,000 abortions in his practice. They started video taping the fetus while a suction abortion was taking place and the fetus was trying to avoid the suction tip and pulling away.....and had its mouth open as though he were screaming with pain as his arm got removed , his leg, and finally his head.....once that doctor saw on film what the fetus goes through....he could never perform another abortion again........He also, became a born-again Christian and weeps with sorrow over what he did for money , to 60,000l little babies lives.......he said before he asked for forgiveness .......that , he couldn't sleep.....he would have terrible nightmares. The sad thing about abortion too...is that it not only effects the babies life......but the mothers and the fathers conscience for the rest of their lives............Do you ever watch James Robeson on christian TV......he was conceived during his mother being raped....she tried to abort him , but it didn't happen.......he is now a awesome minister and a wonderful man. As a nurse........I don't think we should be a part of it in our workplace......as a woman I don't either. There are so many woman in this country who have had abortions and I"m sure it breaks God's heart. My heart goes out to them in prayer. God is taking care of their babies and they will see them again, in heaven.........but , I believe , only if they will ask for forgiveness can they be joined with them for an eternity....that's what Jesus died on the cross for ........all those 10 commandments, so we can live a forgiven past and have hope for a spiritual future.

The United States is a melting pot. Universities like diversity. We can't discriminate. I've never seen an animal act like he/she wasn't what he was born as. But............. I've seen men act and look like woman, I've seen woman act and look like men. So, what. I"ve worked with gay men nurses and I"ve worked with gay woman nurses. I"ve taken care of transgender patients. Work is work......nursing is nursing.......for some its a role and for some its a job, and for some its what they like to do. I worked in a nusing home where all the social workers and administration and office help and even a few nurses, brought their dogs into work with them . One male nurse even let his dog be by his side while he passed meds. Some patients like the dogs , some didn't, I didn't particularly like the stinky dogs under my feet while I charted, but that's my preference...I don't want a dog in my house, or bed, some people sleep with their dogs It's getting very poplular now days , to have animals in nursing homes......where I worked, two male patients in one room, one had a dog and the other didn't. One was a Paraphelgic and had a huge skin graft on his sacrum which we were dressing BID. He decided after a few weeks that having a dog in the room was not a good idea for his wound healing.........he asked administration to change the guy's room , because of the dog........they did......so everyone gets accomodated in some way, if they have a problem with something. Not sure if anyone followed up on the hurt feelings of the dog owner.........but I'm sure he had some and I'm sure he also understood.......but abnormality brings a certain amount of acceptance and then again it wiill bring a certain amount of rejection. So, that's life. We are all just human , some don't like being human, some don't like diversity, not everyone will like us.......so as he learns that , and learns to realize that he just can't dress up and be a nurse, and there is more to it than playing a role..........he may drop out of it and go work at Walmart as a greeter.!!!!! LOL.

Go to Dr. Dean's website and look up the article on 'FAST ACTION TO AVERT A NURSING SHORTAGE'. Very good article! He sounds solid on these issures and willing to help us nurses in alot areas. Hope you will take the time to read it in its entirety, 3 pages. Site is called: "Howard Dean for America"

The little time i worked in a Correctional facility....I passed meds. to about 250 inmates a day ! You don't have time to read charts to find out what they have done. YOu can but who has the time. The worst offenders are all put in the same area, some alone, some in the oldest part of the jail in one big barred room.......you aren't allowed to converse with the offenders. they try to and get reprimanded by the guards.

Mad Cow /Crutzfelt-Jacobs syndrome in humans has already been in the U.S. . I cared for a patient, in Michigan, who died of it! I talked with another nurse who had also cared for a patient in a nursing home, who died of it. I talked with the health department about it and I was told in 1996 they had 9 reported cases of it ,in that county in Michigan......!!!!! It's been around awhile......but they have hushed it up!