ilikesharpthings

I played the tuba. Also, I was a 98 lb girl in high school. Awesome, nerdy combo.

I just made this same list (in a slightly different order)! Do we work together...? [emoji6]

Levophed, propofol, fentanyl, protonix, and lovenox. MSICU if you couldn't tell!

Ugh, i hate ears too!!

I like sharp things...

You have intubated people on the floor?!

For some reason, I cannot handle ear wax. Ugh. So gross.

What a lovely, beautifully-written tribute to your daughter, who sounds remarkable! She is fortunate to have parents who see her for who she is and recognize the many gifts she has to offer.

For some reason this person wasn't cooled per the therapeutic hypothermia protocol - as I understand it is was because he was a PEA arrest and very hemodynamically unstable - but I don't know for sure. I wonder if his outcome would have been different.

I'm sure his death was very multifactorial. He had no CHF hx, and the echo tech was on their way when he coded, so the echo wasn't ever done to confirm that his heart was damaged. The rapid bedside echo in the ED was read as normal, but he had coded 2-3x since then, so I'm sure he had some wall motion abnormalities and the extra fluid probably didn't help but he wasn't sustaining a blood pressure and had no urine output with 4 pressors on board, so what else was to be done? I usually am under the impression that diuretics are held when someone is so drastically hypotensive, but if he had maxed out on starlings curve perhaps it would have helped. I'm not sure... At that point however, I was concerned that the neurological damage he had sustained would make his future very bleak, even if his heart somehow could have recovered. With 4 rounds of CPR, his brain perfusion couldn't have been all that great, even with the best compressions!

Patient was scheduled for an elective, outpatient surgery. Woke up early to shower, and fell to the ground, breathless and weak. Wife called 911. Pt coded in ambulance. Coded again in ED. A third time in CT. Found a massive PE. tPA was given and pt was sent to ICU. When I assumed care, pt was on Levo, heparin, bicarbonate, MIVF. No UOP despite being 8L positive. Poor neuro exam. Became more hypotensive with stable H/H, and dobutamine was started. Then he became bradycardic and lost his pulse. I was the first on his chest. His ribs were already broken. 2 rounds of CPR, and some epi, and he went into VT. 1 shock brought a rhythm back. Started epi drip. Had to add vaso, as I couldn't keep his pressure up with everything else maxed. It looked like he was gonna code again, but I was able to speak to the family first and tell them that it wasn't a matter of if he would code again, but when. I told them that we would respect their wishes, but that we were doing our best to keep him alive and his heart couldn't take much more. And that even if we got him back he would never be the same. They decided against more CPR/shocks and elected to let him go as peacefully as possible (still intubated, sedated, and maxed on 4 pressors). He died shortly thereafter, his family surrounding him and holding his hands, instead of having his chest pounded on and electrical currents rip through his body. I'm 5 months in as an ICU nurse, and this was by far the most unstable patient I have cared for. While it is very sad that his life ended in such a tragic and unexpected way, I am glad that I was able to help this family accept their loved one's death and allow him to slip away with some semblance of dignity and comfort. I am not a a cryer, and maintain a healthy disconnect from my job, but as I held the wife of this man, I wept with her. As I watched his brothers say goodbye, I remember having to say goodbye to my husbands brother, who was taken from us all too quickly as well, and the tears came. I was in no way emotionally connected to this family, and my tears were not for me. I have now become a major player in the absolute worst day of their lives. They will remember my face, my words, my actions. My tears were for them. They will remember a nurse who was willing to grieve with them and recognize that my average day at work was the most horrific day they have ever experienced. I came home that night, took a bath, drank some wine, and went to bed. I will return to work, return to another sick person, and life will go on. They will return to an empty chair at the table, a vacant side of the bed, family photos where one is missing. This job is sacred. We are walking the line between life and death, between hope and hopelessness, between "do everything" and "let him go". I am proud to be an ICU nurse.

In my ICU, I rig up a IV pole near the in-cabinet toilet in the room. I tape a suction tubing up by the top hook and drape it into the toilet. Then I hang the effluent bag and hook the tubing to the drainage port, open it, and let it drain into the toilet. I have 2 bags going so that I can just change them whenever the bag fills and needs to be changed.

Raise the ivpb higher or lower the maintenance. Also, sometimes maintenance fluid will back up into the piggyback tubing.

They could be in the process of obtaining your background check or references before they make an offer. That process can be lengthy.

I thought I wanted L&D or peds. Now work in an adult MSICU and love it! Wanna stay as far away from OB and peds as I can!

I work in a small hospital with one IV nurse each shift who puts in PICCs and does all central line dressing changes. They are also available to start peripheral IVs if needed. So many nurses just call the IV nurse to do all their starts and it can really cause a delay in care if you're waiting around for an IV nurse who may be in the middle of a sterile procedure. I always do my own IVs unless I've tried twice or if it's a notoriously hard stick on someone with very limited access due to a dialysis fistula or something like that. I also offer to start IVs for my coworkers if they were just planning to call the IV nurse. I've heard of scenarios where IV antibiotics were very late or a CT was delayed because the floor nurse lacked the skills to do a pretty simple nursing task due to relying solely on the IV team. I think that depending on how available your IV team is, it would be worth explaining to your manager that it is an important skill for bedside nurses to have!

What does mean? I see this a lot, colons on either side of a word and I can't figure out what it means! 😋

I have the pink restricted limb band on mine!

I was having such a "Q word" day at work today. Never said the word itself, but someone must have because about an hour before shift change I got an ICU transfer, then I had to respond to 3 RRTs within 10 mins of each other (I was code nurse), then one of those patients coded once they got to ICU. Then my non-English speaking PNA admit from earlier in the day started developing chest pain! It almost seemed like we were being punk'd! It was a good thing the day was so mild up to that point because I was all caught up before the poo hit the fan!

I work 12 hr days on a med/tele floor and usually took 3 pumping breaks (the middle one was in conjunction with lunch and I had a hands free set up so I could eat while I pumped). Most of my coworkers were happy to cover for me. A few things that helped me: 1) I had 3 sets of parts for my pump, and I would just put the dirty sets in a ziploc bag and use a clean part for my next session. Not having to wash parts at the hospital decreased the time I needed to be off the floor, and then I'd just wash and sanitize everything really well at home after work each day. 2) hands-free is a must! Then you can snack, use cell phone, whatever you need to do to distract yourself from obsessing over each drop of milk! It's so important to be relaxed and comfortable and not to be worrying about volume! 3) I would always tell my "buddy" (the nurse covering my breaks and vise versa) to take their time on their breaks and to make sure to encourage them to take 3 breaks as well! It helped them not to resent the time I was off the floor. Hope this helps! Congrats on being a working mom! It's hard but so worth it!

I'm in Oregon, on a med-tele floor. We have a 1:4 ratio, 1:5-6 on nights. It's pretty great! I don't know how you guys do it with 7-8 patients!

"The King will reply, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.'" - Jesus

I recently brought a 70-something post-op patient a couple of warm blankets and she said, "oh honey, at my age that is better than sex!". ☺️Cracked me up!!

ISTJ - med c tele

I just bought a new littman stethoscope and the instructions specifically said to use alcohol to prevent ruining the tubing. My old one (a lightweight littman) I used the clorhexidine wipes and the tubing hardened.