curleysue

I went to Linfield McMinnville campus for 2 years and then to the Portland Nursing campus for 1 year until I got sick with meningitis but anyways, yes its super expensive, I owe like $30K and I still have 1 year left of my BSN. And that is with grants and loans. I almost wished I just went to PCC or OHSU. I now work at OHSU and am looking to apply in the winter for 2007. Linfield has not recieved that good of reviews from what I hear from employees at OHSU. I guess their students didn't pass as good on the boards as average. Oh well, just thought I would put my two cents in.

You must live really close to Mt. Saint Helens. I am from Eastern Oregon so I don't feel it. I heard on the news channel today that the USGS service is thinking with the increase in magnitude and activity of earthquakes, the mountain might have another burp. Monday though there was so much fog and clouds that nobody could see it if anything were to happen. I am excited to see some lava flow sometime. But not enough to harm anybody or homes. I think that would be exciting. Take care. Curleysue

Hey All- I just found out about these awsome shoes called MBT that can almost guarentee to tone your muscles in your feet, ankles, hamstrings, thigh, butt, stomach and back. I went to a home show we had in our town and there was this exhibit about these shoes. I have severe plantar fasciitis (heel pain) and these shoes are awsome, my feet are not supposed to not hurt in them at all. You guys got to check these out. However the only downside is that they are around $220 but its well worth it. Website is: www.swissmasaius.com There are 12 styles to choose from including shoes good for nursing (professional style). I guess the shoe lifts and aligns you body on its own center of gravity thus forcing you to use weakened muscles. As the body lenghtens and tightens with each step, circulation improves and strength is regained. So not only are they comfortable and your feet feel so good in them, but they actually help tone your muscles and get this, they can help with cellulite and varicose veins cause they increase circulation to your legs when your posture is re-aligned with they shoes. I bought them and they made a mold to the shape of my feet including the bottom arch of my foot. I am really excited to get them and try them out! Curleysue. :)

Wow, no replies yet. There are a lot of nurses on this forum who would probably know a lot more than me but I felt bad that no one had responded yet. For nursing school I used dansko clogs which were awsome, I was just uncordinated and tripped in them a couple times but they seem to make your feet feel so good. I had awsome athletic shoes and tried those out but by about 5 hours of standing on my feet my heels and arches started hurting. So that is when I got my clogs. If you have no trouble walking in heels you shouldn't have trouble walking in clogs. Or maybe its just me that is uncordinated. Also, if your feet still hurt I guess there is a weird looking shoes with a spring like coil on the heel of the shoe. I think some nurses swear by this shoe, that it makes you feet feel so good. I have no idea what they are called but maybe someone on this forum can tell you. IF you have good insurance, I would go to a podiatrist and get a cast molding of your feet to have personal orthotics to put in your shoes. These I swear by. They are awsome. No pain after 12 hours on my feet!! Unfortunetely somehow I developed plantar fasciitis which is when the fascia that connects your heel to your arch (I think) is torn. I am in a cast on one leg right now for two weeks and then two weeks on the right later. I might have to have surgery if we cannot get my heels feeling better. I wouldn't worry about getting this though unless you have extreme heel pain. You get this condition when you have been not on your feet for quite a while and then all of a sudden start 5 days a week 8 hours a day on your feet. That can sometimes tear your fascia which is what happened to me. I have it in both feet which is odd. But I consider myself odd anyways. Well, good luck. I would go the podiatrist route and get a personal fitted orthotic to wear in your shoe. Without insurance it can run like $600! Take care, Curleysue :)

RJFLYN- Thanks for the reply. Yes its a tough case. Since I was 18 I have been so sick with meningitis twice, DVT's 4 times, PE's bilateral 2 times, oxygen therapy for 2 years, 8 surgeries, polycystic ovaries, multiple pnemonia and pnemothorax's. Its just SICK! WHEN WILL IT STOP. Now I am in the hospital (small rural hospital) monday, wednesday and friday for IV magnesium cause I am so low. We don't know why. I have been to every specialists in a major university hospital for that and the kidney doc just says, "yes its your kidneys but I don't know what to do". WHAT?! THey don't know what to do. I cannot be hooked up to an IV pole three times a week for the rest of my life! I am only 25. So life is really rough for me. And now with my CBC being so off wack. My internist says, I think you are definetly bleeding somewhere. Like that isn't scary enough. Yes I have been on lovenox multiple times. So, I don't know if that would be what they want to do or not. I think its time to save money and go to MAYO clinic to get some awnsers. I know my doctor said my red blood cells are really tiny and abnormal shapes and sizes. Whatever that means I don't know. So, I will definetly go back to my hematologist if we don't find what is going on. Thanks for listening. Curleysue

Thanks for all the wonderful information. I am definetly not using this site to be diagnosed I just thought I would get some input on other medical professionals. Hundreds of heads together is better than one! To answer some questions: No I do not take any NSAIDs cause I take coumadin however I have had two times were my INR was above 10! At those times I was quickly given vit K. I do already take carafate so that route has been tried. I do have a hematologist who I saw when I got all the PE's and DVT's to be tested for hypercouagability so I can still see him about this is the endo and colonoscopy is negative. Yes I do eat meat, I am no vegatarian by far. Yes, I know about braintalk.org but last I heard it was only a read only website. I'll have to look at it again. Again thanks for all the info. I just cannot wait to start my bowel prep on monday! Joy. Take care. Curleysue

since october 2004 my cbc labs have been dropping significantly. my labs are as follows: type date results reference range hemaglobin 10/04 11.3 12.4-15.7 12/04 10.5 02/05 9.8 03/05 9.5 hemacrit 10/04 35 37.7-47 12/04 32 02/05 29.4 03/05 31 mcv 10/04 74.6 82-97 11/04 72.7 12/04 69 02/05 65.4 03/05 64.7 my internist was very concerned about these values especially since i am on coumadin therapy. i have no periods cause of polycystic disease so i am not bleeding from there. so we are totally puzzled why my lab values are dropping! its scary, i could be bleeding internally and not know it. the one diagnosis we got out of this was severe chronic anemia which makes me so so exhausted! so next wednesday i am going into the or and having an upper endoscopy and lower colonoscopy to find out if i am bleeding in my intestines. my bowel movement look normal to me, no blood or coffee colored stools that i know of. but what else could it be? any ideas? let me know. if my values keep dropping i will need a blood transfusion. oh and i am taking iron pills and have been for 3-4 months. thanks for listening, curleysue :uhoh21:

I can't report all the stuff I do cause she already told me that they are not paying me for all those extra stuff that is not on my job description list. I know I will lose my job cause my supervisor is going out for a visit to her house to actually determine is she needs all the hours that I am working. I feel like if I let her know of all the things I am doing out of my way she will dock hours off from her and I will be punished by not getting enough hours. See my point? I am stuck. I don't have another job lined up to work if hours are taken away from her. I am trying to raise money to finish nursing school, I only have one year left. So do you understand now? I wish there was a job opening so I could say, "See ya" but there isn't. CS

Hairstylingnurse- Sometimes I do feel like I am doing way too much housework and not enough nursing care! Both of my clients manipulate me, and I take it cause I cannot afford to loose my job. Today I got into an arguement with my client cause she wanted me to pick up cat poop. I said its not in my job description but I would happily give some gloves to her non-disabled husband. Oh no she said, its you job plus cause he has a huge gag reflex and would throw up. Excuse me?! THis is like the 4th time she has had me pick up cat ****. I suggested she get cat litter box so her cats would stop pooping on the carpet, but oh no, she said she already trained her cats to go outside and that it might confuse them. I was like Oh my gosh, are you stupid! The cat is going to go in the house when it needs to go and I am always the ONE to have to pick up the sh*t! I am so mad. I said its not in my job description and that I can give her husband (who was home) a pair of gloves to pick it up and she said, Oh no you cannot make him do it, he will throw up at the smell. Well, excuse me, I hate the smell too, but I have to pick it up?! I go out of my way in a lot of things to help her out. I take her daughter to school everyday and I don't get paid for it, plus I bought her sheets and cleaning supplies when I first started working there cause she was so poor. I have about had it. However I cannot quit with her yet until I get another job lined up. And full time caregiver jobs are hard to find in my small town. So I AM STUCK! AHHH! I am so mad. SHe manipulates me into doing everything. Her and her husband trash the house everyday and it takes me hours to clean up. However according to my job description I am only supposed to pick up after her! But that never happens. Do you see what kind of predictimate I am in? I called my boss and said I am up for a new job as soon as one comes in. So I cannot wait until one comes. Sorry to vent but I had a very bad bad day. CS :rotfl:

I live near Portland, OR and saw the mountain burp at about 5:30pm when it spit out a bunch of ash and smoke. It was an awsome site. I was just excited for lava flow!! Curleysue

Future nurse- I know how frustrating it is waiting for your doc to call and at five till five you call again saying, "Now what am I supposed to do?" I have a doc like this right now who has denied me my twice a week magnesium infusion till he can see me. Okay so at the end of the week when my heart is racing and skipping beats and my mucscles hurt so bad from cramping, than that is when you want me to go to the ER? When it would be cheaper for him to just write the order for twice a week like it was last month?! I mean its really terrible, I have been getting magneisum infusions for 1 year and when I heard my insurance was cutting me off I decided to try once a week cause eachtime I have an infusion its $500. So when I found out last week that I couldn't make it once a week I had to go to the ER on a saturday cause he refused to see me on the Friday. So this week I tried to get into him but because we live in a small town all the other internist are not accepting new patients so he is the only thing I have. But we won't change my stupid order till he sees me on the 14th of March! Its so frustrating. Sorry I had to vent. Yah, and I have been caught in your situation also with a migraine. Then you end up at the ER at 5:30pm and they look at you like you some kind of idiot or drug seeker. That you purposly waited till 5:30pm so you could get a shot of demerol and phenergan and go home? Oh well. At least now I have found a pain doctor who gave me shots to take at home when it gets too bad. Thats always nice. Take care. Curleysue :rotfl:

Its kinda hard to learn the difference between drug seekers and the real pain cause as a nurse its hard in some cases cause sometimes you just cannot figure out which patients are just abusing the system to get their 'high'. I know a lot of nurses have been trained to keep their mouths shut and whatever the doctor orders the patient needs. I guess after a while working in the ER you learn who is the classic drug seekers and frequent flyers. I saw a TV show that had a frequent flyer who would fake seizure out of the hospital setting so that an ambulance would come and immediately give her valium or versed. But as soon as she would get the medication she would wake up like nothing happened. The paramedic caused it 'psuedo-seizures'. She would be so good at it she even wet herself. Finally after so many times doing it the ER caught onto it and the ER doc confronted her about it and she admitted she was trying to kick methamphetamines and that she needed help with the withdrawls. I think confronting patients who are drug seekers might get them to admit something. At least for a few people but not all. Some docs will, knowing the patient is a drug seeker, just say give her what she wants and get her out of here. But that isn't such a good solution. However, what if someday you are wrong and they are really in pain? That is the other issue with it. How can you really determine who is faking it and who isn't. Anyways, good luck in the ER. I loved working there as a paramedic and would love to do it when I am done with my BSN. Its exciting. Although the drug seeking behavior seems to be a huge topic in the ER nursing forum. It must be just a huge problem and frustrating for both the docs and nurses. Curleysue :uhoh21:

And plus the sad thing is, the assisted living facilty that I worked at who's RN was hardly there, she trusted the MA's to fill out the MAR sheets on their own even with new meds and all that. We had one of the med aides who was actually working as the supervising med aid (with absolutely no background in pharm or nursing) and she had written the wrong times and dosages on the MAR sheet one day and the patient went TWO WEEKS with it like that until the doctor found out about it. Lets just say she is now working as just a resident assistant. What I find odd is that the RN who was hardley ever there, only delegated us on insulin shots. She never asked us about the MAR's or even trained us herself on them. We were actually just trained by other med aides. It just insane! Honestly. The amount of mistakes these so called med aides were making would of easily been avoided if they would of taught them about the 5 R's rule. And some of the most stupidest MA's were caught many times by me or other CNA's as giving the patients the wrong meds and it was like the RN would say, "this is to be kept between you and I, nobody needs to know about this" Yah right, I knew right then that this place was definetly not for me. Its scary to know its still operating today. Scary. Curleysue

Hey it looks like the majority of y'all hate the thought of med aides. I guess they are legal in OR cause I have worked as one at an assisted living facility. It was scary though a lot of the med aides had no previous medication or nursing educaiton. Me, I was a CNA and was on my spring break of nursing school and had one year left of my BSN. I was the ONLY med aid with any background in pharmacology and nursing. We all worked under a RN who was only at our facility once a week. Lets just say I only worked there for 4 months cause it was scary. Lots of med aides were getting fired cause they made major mistakes on the MAR sheets and many patients had either recieved the wrong dosage or the wrong meds. I never had any mistakes but it took me only a few weeks to figure out that this was really a bad thing, having unsupervised med aides with no background. They were not trained in looking up meds in the med books or even the simple tasks of the 5 R's. I agree with all of you, med aides are a bad thing. They should have some form of prior education in pharmacology and nursing. It is indeed a scary thought, having one of your relatives in the care of an unsupervised non-educated person. They also did no criminal background checks. Thats really scary! Take care. Curleysue

I think that is a good idea. When a frequent flyer does come in why doesn't the nurse take a minute to sit down with them and tell them straight up that this behavior has been recognized and it not acceptable and to let them know the exact thing Future Nurse has said, the PCP will be notified and asked to help you find out a good care plan for the patient when this happens instead of seeking narcs in a ER. I think a lot of patients who have this behavior get away with it in the ER and nobody attempts to sit down with them and let them know that they are being watched closely cause of the behavior. I have seen a lot of nurses just shut their mouths cause they are afriad of opening them in fear they will uncontrolably go off on the patient. But seriously the FF who come in and don't hear anything about being watched will just continue coming in and getting what they want not knowing its unacceptable. I also think its a great idea to get Social Workers somehow involved in getting help for them if they don't have a PCP and are experiencing chronic conditions. I know Social Workers might have a big problem with that saying they don't have the time to deal with FF but then maybe we need more Social Workers?! I think instead of keeping the frustation of it all to ourselves, let the patients know that yes, this is unacceptable behavior and next time you will not recieve narcs. I don't know if that would work, but something needs to happen. Course there will be those FF who work the system and still get away with it but I do believe that we could get lucky with a few FF and they may admit they have a problem. Just an idea. Curleysue

I just had to share... I just received news today that the appeal to Blue Cross for terminating my insurance due to medical necessity was overturned today! I get my insurance back! I am so excited. This means I don't have to pay anything out of pocket! Oh my gosh. If you don't know what I was battleing with Blue Cross I will tell you. About 2 months ago they told me that they were terminating my coverage because they said I was seeking un-need medical care, like the frequent infusions. Well we fought this so hard. My sis's best friend is a lawyer and so is her father for a major law firm. She helped us with all of this and sent a nasty letter to blue cross. As well as all my doctors including the nephrologist, cardiologist, rhematologist and internist saying that all this medical care I was recieving was for a REAL condition that I am fighting so it was all so unfair but I seriously thought I lost that insurance, which is a COBRA plan through my parents for another year. So, I ended up getting free insurance through my work but like I said it was just a "better than nothing plan" that made me pay like 30% of all bills and 50% of my meds! And to make matters worse, there was no out of pocket maximum! So, I would be paying so much money and there wouldn't be a stop loss. So, forgive me but I am so excited. That ER visit I just had, I won't have to pay all that money for it! OH, I am so relieved. Now back to my mag. Thanks for the previous post. I am contacting Oregon Health Sciences University Renal department to see if they can help me. At least maybe I should go see their nephrologist and see if they have any suggestions. So thanks everyone. I am still fighting this! Curleysue :yelclap:

I know exactely what your are talking about. That is SO TRUE! Its hard to work day shift as both a nurse and CNA. As a nurse you have doctors rounding and new orders to deal with, plus getting them their AM and NOON meds, making sure they are off to surgery or X-ray, and its just one of the most hecteck times. And for CNA you like KitKat says, wash and get up all your patients, deal with the AM and NOON meals plus AM and NOON vitals and so on. I really tried to AVOID day shift cause of all that. Course the plus side of being busy is that your time flys by but I think evening shift is the best, that is if you don't have a big family life and want to be home for dinner and stuff. But evening shift is more layed back, only one meal, not as many med times and things are getting settled down for night shift. So, I guess its not only a matter of what time the shifts are but whats happening at those shifts that is a big big factor. So, good luck and I think you should go for it, become a nurse and see what happens. Curleysue :)

I remember working at a big uniersity hospital ER as a tech and having a homeless man who was a frequent flyer who would come in everyother day or everyday almost complaining of chest pain just so he could get a warm bed to sleep in and a hot meal. He had a million dollar workup when he began this rountine that included a echo, chest x-rays, angiogram and you name it, EVERYTHING that determined he had absolutely nothing wrong with his heart and yet he could come in and say Yes I guess I am having chest pains and those words would get him back immediately and a stay for the night. I mean it was so awful. He would immediately turn over on his side and request a warm blanket so he could sleep.. And its not like we couldn't tell he was sleeping cause the man SNORED so loud!! It is such an awful abuse to the system, and just knowing that our tax dollars are paying for this. I mean come on, why do these people do this to us? Curleysue

Hey all you Home health nurses and aides- Just wondered about a few question regarding my own health. Currently and over the last year and a half I have had severe hypomagnesiumia. I require two 5 hour infusions of mag sulphate just to survive. As of now, I have seen a total of 12 specialist regarding this condition and we now know that my kidneys are to blame for this and that doctors don't know how to treat it. I have tried oral magnesium (just about every kind) which gives me really bad diarrhea and nausea with vomiting so I think I loose more electrolytes than gain with taking it orally. So I have resorted to IV mag sulphate 5grams twice a week. The infusion makes me feel not that good so they run it slow, about 1gram an hour and I require pre-medication IV phenergan and IV benedryl just to keep me comfortable. After the infusion I am tired but by the next morning I feel so good! And my symptoms are usually gone for about 2.5-3 days. Let me tell you about my symptoms when I am low and needing an infusion. About 2.5 days after an infusion I start getting very fatigue, and my muscles start to spasm, ache really bad, and cramp. You know when you get a cramp in the arch of your foot? Hurts bad?! I get those about every hour in my extremities when I am low. After about 8 hours of that my muscles get so tender from the contractions that its hard for me to move around. Some other symptoms that come are sinus tachycardia, sometimes SVT but I just got an ablation for that, and PVC's. My blood pressure goes up, heart rate up and then I start to get severe headaches. Amazingly enough migraine headaches are now being treated with mag sulphate so there is a connection there somehow. Those are the main symptoms that can also become life threatening especially the heart. My cardiologist wants my mag level to be above 2.0. My average mag level is 1.4-1.7 with the highest its ever been at 1.8. So its an endless struggle to get it at a level that is non symptomatic. I guess if my magnesium levels stay low like this for long periods of time I can end up with some drastic health conditions later in life including renal failure and heart failure. So needless to say this is a serious condition and seems to be rather rare. So I have seen a nephrologist, cardiologist, rhematologist, endocrinologist, hematologist, pulmonologist, immunologist and the list goes on. So either I get these infusions of life or I guess my next step is to go to the Mayo Clinic or somewhere I don't know. No one seems to know what to do and there is not a whole lot of information on the internet about it. But anyways I have posted on the main nurses forum to see if anyone had any ideas and most of them had said I should try to get my insurance to cover home infusions. But the thing is, is that I am not homebound, I may have a real hard time getting out of the home when I am low but I am only 25 years old and have a part time job so I don't know how hard it would be to get this to work. I have a chest port and it is not accessed all the time and only is accessed when I go in for infusions so be being a nursing student I think I would be totally capable of accessing and/or maintaining the port if I got home infusions. And I don't know if I would be able to get my pre-medications of IV benadryl and phenergan at home or would I have to be in a hospital setting for those. So, if you guys have any information about how all of this stuff works about asking the insurance company or how easy it would be for me to have them at home. I definetely think its more cost effective to have them at home caues each time I go into the short stay center to get infused its $700 per infusion so at least I think it would be cheaper to have them at home but maybe I am wrong. So any of y'all have info let me know. Thanks, Curleysue

I am still reading through all these posts and like I said before, its definetely teaching me A LOT about how crucial it is to recheck med orders and all the medication steps over and over. Wow. This is an excellent thread. Honestly. Anyways, I wondered after reading some posts that I know mistakes happen to every nurse no matter how careful they are it seems like it will always happen some time. But I questioned, do you guys think that because nurses these days have more patients because of short staffed units that the stress and constant running behind, or just plain being overwhelmed, doesn't that contribute to a higher incidence of med errors? That thought popped into my head after reading a couple pages. I know its not the number one excuse that med errors are made but I definetely question that it has a major inpact on incidence. Do you guys think so? Curleysue

These posts about med errors are seriously freaking me out. I have only read one page (most recent posts) and I am horrified. I know med errors occur quite frequently in fact as a patient I had a nurse give me 150mg IV demerol when it was written as 150mg IM. WOW that was really interesting. I do have a high tolerance for pain meds but that was a little too much. They never had to give me narcan or anything (thank god) but I will say my pain was cured for about 6 hours. But honestly, this is making me think. I am in my senior year of nursing and I think these stories should be told at school! I think it would also freak some people out to be extra extra careful. I cannot think how bad it would be to actually harm or kill someone cause you read a label wrong or didn't check the order with another RN. I just can image the gut wrenching feeling, kinda like when you do something wrong (like getting pulled over for speeding, or something like that) but it would be ten times worse!! :uhoh21: Wow, thanks for these stories and I am sorry a lot of you had to learn the hard way about re-checking. I think it is so much better to be anal about medications. I know I will! Curleysue :stone

Wow, that kinda made me laugh reading this... Now how many nurses do you know actually abid by these requirments? :lol_hitti Curleysue :rotfl: I don't think we would have very many nurses? Just kidding...

I actually thought the same thing when I started nursing school cause I have severe problems with the bone in my feet. First of all my right foot was crushed under a 50inch TV that was dropped while trying to move. Now my foot is basically fused together. The bones broke everywhere and now don't move quite that much anymore. I also developed RSD (Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy) which I cannot describe how bad that is. I actually went to a wonderful pain doc who did sympathetic nerve blocks in my back which helped my foot heal. Anyways, I have such bad foot pain I mean bad . But even through all of that I still was able to work Med/Surg and Peds plus OB clinicals for 8-10 hours and if you get really good shoes or with me good orthotics from a podiatrist it can help a lot. I found a way to work through the pain and plus sit down whenever possible. Even in with a patient, instead of standing and hovering over them (which is intimidating to peds) I sit next to them or pull up a chair to take a H and P or talk or whatever. Sometimes in clinicals I really like to look through patient charts and you can sit doing that. So, I think everyone has pretty much proved the point that yes, you will be on your feet. Some nursing positions maybe a lot less more than others. Like Hospice or Home care. I did that as a CNA before nursing school and it was a lot of companionship, talking and so forth. Read the home health forum and there is a topic of a day in a life as a home health nurse and you pretty much get the gist of what its like. I too think your interest in law would be fun to be a nurse attorney. That would be awsome. Plus the pay, really nice! Or I have also heard of forensic nursing which might interest you. I am not sure what exactely you do in this job. But both of these careers require more schooling after nursing school so you would be in school for a while. And you would probably have to go through all the clinicals of regular nursing school. But hey, maybe its worth a try. GOOD LUCK. CURLEYSUE

Geez... That sound horrible. I hope I never get a stone or pass a stone or anything like that. Once in the hospital for SVT they put in a foley cause of all the fluids they were giving me. I think I was like on 6 IV pumps for a couple different things like TPN and white looking fat juice? something like that. But anyways after a day or so on the foley it started to look pink, then one day it was just bright red and I would look at the tubing going down my leg and big red blood clots were passing through. That was probably the most painful thing I have ever felt and they didn't give me anything for pain. I was so pissed! I thought getting meningitis twice in 2 years was the most painful thing but in those cases they actually gave me meds. It just makes me so upset when docs are so mean about giving pain meds. I mean come on, bright red blood coming out of my bladder! HELLO?! This post is so funny! I LOVE IT...:rotfl:

GEEZ... Some of y'all take these posts way too seriously. HELLO?! We all know it is possible to get a day shift SOMEWHERE as a nurse!! I mean come on. A simple question just takes a simple awnser. YES, you probably can find a day shift job okay. I mean if you had your heart set on a career your whole life and found out when your ready to start that career path that its only graveyard, would you back off of your dream career? Really... Anyways, I am almost scared to post anything anymore cause everyone gets so upset. Oh well. :redlight: :argue: Anyways on a lighter note, how are y'all doing today? Good day? :Melody: