sarasmileRN

I too came accross this older post but thought it an important one to comment on. The beauty of nursing is the great variety of patients we come accross. The challenge to treat without judgement and bias is our duty, but we are human so emotion and morality always get into the mix. I have learned that when I have a client who may be acting out a "drug seeking behavior", I call for a psych consult. These patients will be time consuming, but with the right care plan and the same primary nurse at each admission some bad behaviors can be avoided. However, when the patient comes to you with their own mini pharmacy on-hand and say has a broken bone, these clients actually feel more pain. Their tolerance is low. their receptors not responsive like a non user, and they require higher doses to achieve pain control. At this point an Addictionologist/Pain consult should be ordering the pain meds. For those who are new to the profession: I myself find it hard not to want to judge. It is ok to think about what brought this person to this place in their life. The nurse is still a human. We still think and feel. we still have opinions. The patient may very well be a drug user or even a drug abuser, but if they are in pain then as a nurse we have to treat that pain.

LOl, we love to gossip if its juicy. We eat our young, new, and innocent. It doesn't matter what you say or not say or do. Those kind will and do form their own opinion and spread it. It may or may not be out of spite or jealously but curiousness, but they are well aware that it it against most company's policies to discuss those topics even during break.

I always did everything at once because they are all obviously important tasks,but to give the best answer. Lets just remember in reality.....I probably would have to delegate . While your at the desk, tell the family you will be able to tell them something as soon as you update yourself on all the newest test results so you can have a full understanding of whats going on, but first you have to stablize three other patients. Instruct them to the free coffee and comfy sofa. The family will feel better only hearing this from the Primary Nurse. At the same time with the phone at your chin be dialing recovery to tell them to hold on the patient who is SOB from the O.R. for twenty minutes or so. (In any case the SOB patient would come first.) With your right index finger, motion over to an already overloaded CNA if you have one and ask if they can get a set of vitals and an EKG on the chest pain/dizziness client, press another out-going line and call the house officer or PA, then medicate your pain patient. Of course answering an NCCLEX review question like "oh SOB" easy ABCs; airway first is probably going to look good at interview, but answering the question and going a little bit out of the norm to explain how and why you are doing the steps will resonate with the interviewer. It is what they actually look for. This is just an opinion. SM