kyliern2b

My first reaction was to say that the nursing classes were much harder. When I really thought about it though, I don't think it's that the actual content is harder. It's just that the material is thrown at you so fast. It's hard sometimes to keep up with all the reading and studying every night because you never know when they're going to hit you with a pop quiz. You really have to stay on top of everything and never think that you are going to cram before a test because it just doesn't work that way. At least it doesn't if you want to make an A. Add the clinical paperwork in and all of the busy work that they give you and yeah, you pretty much don't have a life anymore!

Do you have a laboratory diagnostic book? For our clinicals we have to look up every abnormal lab for our patient, list what will cause the lab value to increase/decrease, s/s that would accompany an increased/decreased value, and treatment for the increased/decreased value. Then you have to indicate what information out of all of that applies to your patient. It's time consuming (last week I had 32 labs I had to research), but when you get it all down on paper (or the computer screen) it's really easy to see why your patient has these labs results and what it means for them.

Does anyone have any tips on charting or know of any websites with good examples? I've already received a failure for charting in my clinicals last week and if I get one more I fail the class. I just don't understand what you include in charting and what you leave out. Please help!

I can't stand to be idle, so I was busy the whole day with my patient, helping my fellow students, changing beds, doing vital signs, etc. I really don't think it was anything I did that caused the problem. In fact, I heard that the nurses on this unit routinely treat students this way. I heard some of them grumbling about not being paid to be teachers and not having the time to mess with us students. I'm really hoping that when I'm finished with school I work with nurses who actually like their job and aren't miserable. I've worked in offices before where everyone was miserable and believe me when I say it's contagious.

Has anyone had problems with RN's being unfriendly during clinicals? I just started my first clinical rotation a few weeks ago and the RN's have made it very clear that they don't want us there. The first day I was assigned to a patient the RN for that patient never spoke a word to me. I was feeling so lost and unsure of myself and really would have welcomed some advice or just a kind word, but I couldn't even find the RN most of the time. In fact, the only time I saw her was when the pt's IV ran out and she came in to change it. I followed her out into the hallway thinking that I could ask her some questions...she turned her head away from me and refused to speak. I understand that RN's are incredibly busy, but don't they remember what it was like when they were starting out?

Definitely stay away from Avondale....drugs, crime, etc! I lived in Crestwood and had to move after just one year because everything we owned that wasn't nailed down was stolen. The last straw was when the body of a murder victim was found just a few streets over from us. Crestwood is a nice older neighborhood. The street we lived on was fine. The problem is that the neighborhood is surrounded by low income, high crime areas. Gate City is very close to Crestwood and its an area where you wouldn't even want to drive around in the day with your doors locked and a body guard beside you. Avondale is a definite no...drugs, crime, etc. I understand wanting to be close to school, but peace of mind is important too.

I'm worried about something I learned recently. I'll start at the beginning...I was married to an abusive man. I finally got away, but he stalked me. One night he broke into my home and completely trashed my house, furniture, etc. I called the police and had him arrested. When he was being taken from my house, he told the police that I had broken some things too. Not true, but I guess that didn't matter because they arrested me too. Apparently it didn't matter to them that he violated a restraining order when he broke in. Luckily, the judge was the same one who issued the restraining order so he knew what was going on. He asked me to attend classes for battered women at the local YWCA with the understanding that when I completed the classes, the charges would be dropped and wouldn't show on my record. I attended the classes and thought everything was okay. Now, years later, I find out that the charges still show on my record. I've waited so long to get the chance to go back to college and pursue my dream of being a crna (I'm just working on my BSN now) and I'm scared that this might prevent me from getting my rn license. Will it? It seems so unfair that this horrible person might still be able to keep me from doing what I've always wanted to do.