RN58186

ITNS has a "Core Curriculum for Transplant Nurses" that is an excellent resource. Right now the first edition is on sale for $30 and available on their website.

arrector pili - the muscle around each hair follicle that produces "goose bumps" catarrhal exudate - my instructor wrote "aka snot" on the board for this one. I still make hospital corners on my bed at home.

I echo your thoughts Viva! I have been a patient numerous times and the psych nurses I dealt with were the best. I appreciated that they listened every time I had a concern or problem and never judged me. I felt very secure and well supported. I could never work in mental health, but I am very, very appreciative of those who do!

85 year old lady on a geriatric assessment unit. MD had ordered Premarin lady partsl cream at HS. I went in early in the evening, explained to the lady what it was and why it had been ordered. Doing my HS med rounds, I went in to her room and I reminded her of our earlier conversation and asked permission to proceed. She told me to go ahead, and when I got the applicator full of cream in place she said (rather loudly) "Oh! I haven't had anything in there in a long time!!" Good thing she had a sense of humour because there was no way I was able to keep a straight face.

Our doctors are great. I have heard attending doctors tell residents that "nurses who have been here a while know more about renal than you ever will unless you become a nephrologist - listen to them!" The medical director of our program has been known to tell a resident that "if a senior nurse tells you to come, don't ask why. Just get your butt in there." And recently when a resident from another country told one of our staff doctors (with me in the room) that it was bad enough he has to listen to a female medical director and there was no way he was going to spend the next few years taking orders from "a bunch of nurses - and female nurses at that". While I tried to figure out my reply, our staff doctor just looked at this guy and said "One thing you have to learn right bloody now. This is a NURSE run clinic, and WE are here to do what THEY need. THEY call the shots around here - not us. Our job is to facilitate whatever needs to happen so the nurses can do their job. If you have a problem with this, then perhaps you should re-think this position and return home." I work with the best doctors.

I have been a renal nurse for my entire career. I would never move to another specialty. I work in transplant now but it is still an area that I love. One of my pts told me that he thinks the best nurses are all renal nurses. I know renal gets frowned on because our pts can be challenging, but given what some of them have been through, I'd be a challenging pt too!

The High River hospital is evacuated, Canmore hospital is sheltering in place, Drumheller health centreis evacuated, a number of LTC facilities have been evacuated, the Sheldon Chumir Health Centre in downtown Calgary is closed as are a number of outpatient clinics. A number of the outpatient labs in Calgary are closed as well. All the hospitals here in Calgary are okay thankfully. I have been thinking about those pts in the evacuation zones who need dialysis and other life sustaining treatments. Scary.

I have been an RN for 23 years, and work full time. I will finish this summer a Masters degree in Theology that I have been doing online. I have no plans to go into professional ministry, I took my Masters because it is a topic that I am passionate about and just wanted to learn more. I serve as Chair of the Board at my church as well as Chair of the Deacons'. I will forever be a nurse but have thoroughly enjoyed my studies for my Masters. When I told one of the doctors I work with that I was going to do it she looked at me and said "I think it will be awesome to have someone with that kind of skill set around here" (I work in a busy outpatient clinic). If you are interested in seminary courses I say go for it. Happy to answer any questions if you have any.

I did the Nephrology exam, I worked full time the entire time while doing so. I studied mostly for 3 or 4 hours per weekend and the occasional weekend. Good luck!

Many years ago we had two pts on our floor with identical names (including middle name if you can believe it). They were in the same four bed room, and they were both blind diabetics on peritoneal dialysis. Talk about an error waiting to happen. We had requested that one be moved, but were told if we did all our checks properly an error wouldn't happen. Finally one of the pts requested a move to a different room so they were separated. It was actually kind of scary.

I must say, my manager would NEVER tolerate any of her nurses being spoken to that way. She is like a mama bear looking out for her cubs. One does not abuse her nurses. She would have stepped in immediately if one of the MD's did that to one of us. Having said that, the doctors I work with are great. They have a huge respect for nurses and treat us accordingly. Our doctors listen to us and will often ask us for an opinion because we know the patients better than they do (we do case management and the MD's rotate through every two weeks, so the nurses are the constant). And in turn we have a lot of respect for them.

I work in an outpatient clinic, one of our docs will write the letter to the family doc (I saw Mr X, I recommended this and that, he had no other complaints, return to clinic 6 months) before he even lays an eye on the pt. And gets decidedly annoyed when there actually IS something going on and he has to change the letter.

I haven't worked inpatients for a while so I am sure all my inpatient skills are rather rusty (although when I did I was good at most of them) but where I think I am really good is in palliative care. I not quite sure what it is there that people gravitate toward, but more than one manager and co-worker has told me that is where I really shine.

Yes, absolutely we need to advocate for better mental health care. In all countries. But what really bugs me is whenever something like this happens the media announces "had mental health issues" or "had stopped his/her psychiatric medications". As someone who has a mental health diagnosis, and has endured the stigma attached to it, those kind of statements I find annoying at best and offensive at worst. The media would not announce that the person was diabetic who forgot their insulin, or a cancer patient on chemo. Yet, it is considered appropriate to advance the stigma of mental health patients as violent even though most of us are not. Mental health patients are fair game for having the details of their medical condition and compliance to treatment splashed over the airwaves in a way that would never happen to any other illness. I want to know what makes it acceptable to broadcast this kind of information about anyone, psychiatric patients or otherwise. Why are mental health patients any less deserving of privacy than other patients? Okay, rant over.....

Okay, I have to chime in..... We women all wore caps for grad, the guys in my class (6 of them) did not. All the ladies paid an extra $5 in fees that year for the cap. The guys decided THEY were being discriminated against becasue we all got caps and they didn't. At least one of them went to the registrar and said he wanted a cap too. He was told that he could have one but he couldn't pick it up until after the grad ceremony because they were sure he would wear it (they were right....). Every one of the guys in my class had at least one grad photo taken with the cap on and holding the bouquet of roses same as us. Just makes me chuckle, we didn't think anything of wearing them, but the guys were not pleased that they weren't allowed to!