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Hello, everyone. I'm a new grad working in home health... well not exactly a new grad anymore because it's almost a yr that I've been working for this agency. But I still feel like I don't know much about home health and actually want to quit this job...but I have no other choice...sigh Anyways, today I discharged a pt... Pt asked me if I could ask the office to order 4 boxes of ostomy supply cuz she's been calling the office but they only ordered 2 last time....so she ran out already. So when I called, the office staff said she'll look up if they ordered it and asked me the order number. So I asked "you don't have it?" and she said "I don't know. Can u ask the pt?" Pt gave me the box so I gave the number to her...but she called me again in a few minutes and said "how many boxes? I ordered 2 today." I already told her 4 boxes in the first phone call and it was embarrassing to repeat that cuz I was still at the pt's house. Anyways I got out of the pt's house and my supervisor called me and said "come to office right now." So I asked what is it and she said just come. I thought it was kinda rude to just order to me come to office without telling me why...plus they don't even pay me for mileage... So I said I need to go somewhere so please tell me why and she said I was disrespectful to accuse office staff that she doesn't have the order number when the pt was next to me....and it makes them look bad. I don't know why but I asked her back "you wanted me to come to office to talk about this?" and she seemed to drawn aback cuz she took a while and said I also have some corrections to make on my paperwork... So I said that I was already at the office this morning and nobody told me anything about corrections...also I have to drive back and forth to office because somebody always forgets to give me right paper forms and supply...like this morning but I never complained about it....and I asked the office staff about the order number because the poor pt walks wobbly and she probably have been walking back and forth to get that supply box every time she tried to tell them to order 4 boxes for next order. Then my supervisor told me next time just tell the pt that I will find out instead of blaming office staff because it's not professional...which i agree and next time I come to office they'll just give me bunch of paper forms and supplies so that I don't have to bring a recert form when pt is expecting to be discharged. I did say what I wanted to say but now I feel bad about it...and am afraid they're not gonna give me any work now...even though I hate it, it's still the only nursing job I have...;( I'm planning to apologize to her next time I go to office...do you think it was too rude to talk to a supervisor like that?

Hi guys, I got a call to come in for interview this week for med/surg position. I didn't receive the 'pass/fail' letter but received the letter that I need to reapply. I'm already nervous for this interview...is the second interview going to be like same as the first one?

Ok Thank you so much IVRUS!!! :) Your comments are very helpful!!! if you don't mind, I would like to learn more about about the whole infusion mechanism...is it a book or a research article? When I asked my supervisor about increasing the rate, she was hesitant because of possible cardiac overload...and she told me to raise the rate slowly if I have to... And my patient also told me when the IV was finished in 1.5 hrs, he had some cramps in his stomach...which happened like 30 minutes after but disappeared after a while but I'm not sure if this is related...

Wow thank you for suuch a thorough answer :) The tubing is changed daily but it seems like some tubings are more accurate than other ones. I was with patient today but it was still slow so i raised the pole higher but im not sure if it was helpful cuz it ended up taking 2.5 hrs to finish...so since the accracy of rate can be off by 10-25% off, would it be ok to increase the rate if it takes too long?

1. Dial-a-flow2. Picc line3. Im not sure what you mean by positional...4. pt said he does go to restroom 2-3 tmes and he would go like once when im there5. Zyvox 600mg/300ml over 2 hrs q12h

Hi. I'm a new grad working for home health. I'm currently seeing this pt for IV infusion Q12H for 14 days. We're almost half-way done and I've instructed and validated patient and caregiver's competency for IV infusion so they can infuse the evening dose. The problem is everytime I'm not there...they seem to have problem with IV med infusing around 30 minutes longer or shorter than it should which is 2 hrs... I checked after they had this problem for the first time and they were doing everything okay. Pt is worried that he's not getting his IV infusion correctly because this is his second time for getting IV infusion for the same diagnosis. When I do the infusion, I always finish the IV med on time so Pt wants me to come every time which is twice a day but my agency wouldn't let me and tells me I need to teach them more... So does infusion time matter critically for proper IV infusion? I asked the agency if this would be considered med error but they said it's not...

Hi I'm a new grad working for home health for about 6 months now. Today my patient's daughter called me and ask if I can come read his TB skin test result that he got at Dr's office yesterday and Dr told her it's ok for hh nurse to read it. I know how to read the result but I've never done it before and I'm also not the one who gave the shot. So I asked my agency if I can do that and they said no problem but they never had that happened before either so they didn't have right form for me to write the result... I asked dr's office about this and they said it's ok and told me what kind of thing I should write down for my result and fax it to them. But now I'm not so sure anymore because it's my first time and I don't want to read it wrong and lose my license... Now I'm not sure what to do...should I tell my Pt to have it read at MD office again or should I still go read it tomorrow?

Thanks Isabelle49 Like you said, globally assessing pain was what they wanted. I didn't ask those additional questions like 'do you ever experience pain? how often? what makes it worse?' kinda stuff that are right below the pain question on OASIS. The office staff said the surveyors said its like I didn't do assessment at all...so that comment got me pretty frustrated...;( And she also said I didn't write down one of her allergy...so that's pretty big deal too... But I did learn from it so that I ask my patients every single questions on OASIS. I just hope nothing happens from this experience though...

Thanks merlee!!! You don't know how much your reply helps my troubled mind... My ultimate goal is to get a job in hospital like any other new grad nurses and I don't want to add another problem on top of my lack of nursing experience...lol And that person who told me that is not a nurse...she's one of office staffs...I asked her what does usually happen if you get a citation and she told me that...I guess she was telling me the worst scenario so I don't make any more documentation errors...? :uhoh21: But I've learned that I should definitely work on my assessment skills and documentation. Thanks for your reply:redbeathe

Hello. I'm a new grad nurse who just started with a home health agency about a month ago. A few days ago, my agency called me really late at night to tell me that I need to come in right now or early in the next morning to complete my paperwork cuz department of health was gonna come next day for a survey. I completed most of the paperwork as they told me (which they didn't orient me on) but they told me today that they got a citation on one of my patient whom I recently recertified. They said surveyors pointed out I didn't make a thorough assessment according to OASIS especially about pain... Apparently when they went to see Pt at home she had some pain...but on my OASIS, I put she doesnt have any pain cuz she didn't when I was there... My agency didn't tell me much about the citation in detail but told me to be more thorough with my documentation...and also said it's part of my experience. But I'm so scared right now because they said the surveyors took a copy of my recert OASIS to compare with their assessment and see if there's anymore discrepancies... I reviewed the chart again to make sure if I did everything else complete and except for the very last page (summary page to send to MD), everything is complete and matching. My agency told me not to worry as long as I didn't cause any harm or med errors which I checked and seemed fine but I can't stop worrying...because one of the staff told me they might suspend my license if I did make such mistake...;( I'm just trying to think positive and forget about it but I can't stop worrying...I feel so incompetent as a nurse... Does anybody else have experience like me? Please share...

Hello fellow new grad nurses. I recently quit my first RN job and am hunting for new job but its so hard because no place is calling me back... I'm preparing for the interview but I'm afraid that having quit my first job is affecting me getting a new job. I think that place was no good fit for new grad at all...because the new grad whom I gave orientation before I resigned also quit a month after I did... It was a small home health agency and DON gave me a real hard time.. .it's hard to list all the things she did to me but one that tops it all is the time that she was screaming that she would sue me when I was speaking in non-English language to the patient on the phone who only spoke the same language that I did. The patient didn't speak English and she was telling me she needs to go to ER...I explained the situation to the DON after I got off the phone and also told her I couldn't understand the patient right because she was yelling right next to me that she would sue me when I was on the phone....but she yelled at me even more that I didn't ask enough questions to the patient to assess even in my own language and I can't multi-task... So I quit after not being able to stand up to her constantly yelling at me and belittling me on how stupid I am... And also I was only working at the office with no proper orientation given...but they started pushing me to see Pts without orientation because they were short-staffed...I told them I'm not comfortable but she would mock me with a tone like when are you ever gonna be comfortable...when she wouldnt go see pt herself... When I resigned, the administrator (who is not a nurse) thought I worked fine and offered me to work in her other home health company...I said no at the moment but she told me to come anytime I want...I definitely don't wanna go back knowing her management style and I would be doing same job again... I really want to work in hospital with proper amount of orientation and staff that I could cooperate with... At this point I feel like this past job experience is holding my foot because of the short time I was there (about 8 months) and the kind of job i was doing (i only did intake coordinator)... Also even if I get an interview...if I ever get one...I dont know how to explain about this experience in a good way...I took the job a few wks after I got my license just because it was the only place called me and never looked up other places... It's been almost a month since I quit and I'm getting more anxious...I'm starting to think if i should work for the administrator's other company just so it doesn't look bad on my resume...

Hi, I'm a new grad who finally landed a first job interview after a long job hunting. I'm really excited because the hospital I've got the interview with is where I wanted to work but I have an experience of volunteering here a few years ago and I didn't fulfill the required minimum time for volunteering. The main reason I stopped volunteering was they never had anything for me to do and I didn't feel welcomed to volunteer cuz I always felt like I was in the way... I was also in nursing program so I guess I stopped going after starting school... I know I was very irresponsible for not committing enough hours as I promised and I'm scared that it would hurt me getting a job at this hospital... They also had a question asking if I ever volunteered at their hospital on their online resume...so I'm really scared of what to say when they do ask me why I quit volunteering during the interview... I hope they don't ask but if they do ask, what should I tell them? Should I just tell them how I felt during volunteering or should I just come up with some excuse...?

omg the trick really works!!! im officially an RN!!!!

Hello! I just took my test this morning and tried the trick just now and I got the good popup!!!! Does it really mean I passed??? I feel so horrible because I was doing really horrible towards the end and I had 78-79 questions....and the last two questions seemed like below average level questions but I didnt know the answer to it...I had a lot of SATA questions, 1 math question, 1 exhibit question, and 1 picture question...I'm so scared and feeling like I'm gonna cry but after seeing the good popup, I'm feeeling a little better....I really hope it works....I'm in CA and does this trick work 100%??? I dont think I can do anything until I really see my name on BRN website...

Hello. I will be graduating with my ADN degree this December but I just decided to get my BSN after passing NCLEX. My top choice is CSULA but I'll be also applying to CSUN and CSULB. But I have horrible horrible grades...thankfully I haven't failed any courses but I could never pull any A's...even for the pre-req's I had to do for ADN nursing program. So I looked into CSULA's admission requirements for nursing school and it stated transferring RN students require only passing grades for prerequisites but this was posted on 2008. And the website doesn't show a lot of information for RN-BSN program so I was wondering if anybody who knows about the admission requirement can give me the information. Thank you!!!!!