hikernurse

Of course you passed, you were so ready :-). Congratulations!!

Kids with multiple congenital anomalies always grab my heart. They have a lot of issues, but are interesting and something about them just pulls me in, they are so beautiful in their own way. Lots of these kiddos have families who don't show much and I love that I can be there for them :).

They can in some states...

And who among us hasn't done that, right??

Um, the light bulb in his ceiling burned out and he was using the flashlight to see to change the bulb. He unfortunately was naked and accidentally fell on the flashlight at which point it inserted itself into his bum. Totally accidental.

This is more the case where I live. Police officers will target areas right outside the hospital right around shift change. Especially in the morning, there can be several cars with nurse drivers pulled over, waiting for their tickets to be issued. To be honest, after working a night shift (and scheduled for one later that day) I know all I want to do is get home and in bed ASAP.

You're exactly where I would expect you to be at this point! Give yourself some time. When you do something well--even something you might not think is a big deal--give yourself credit. That will help build confidence. Also, finding a few unofficial mentors to run thoughts past would help. Most nurses are happy to help a less-experienced nurse. As far as the recommendation part of SBAR, it doesn't have to be an entire care plan, it can be as easy as recommending a physician assess the patient in person or giving fluid. You'll find that there tend to be typical issues on your ward. I am a NICU nurse and a common order would be a CBC, CRP and CXR. Other units might find that giving fluid is a common response. I guess my point is that with experience you'll get to have a pretty good idea of what needs to be done. I promise it gets easier! It won't be all that long before you look back and can't imagine ever not knowing what you don't yet know now .

We love our female docs where I work. They're pretty awesome :).

Wow, thanks GrnTea! This info was helpful to at least one of us :). Off to research this...

I wouldn't argue with you . You do need a working knowledge of APA because the headings/content, etc., can't really be formatted by even the best software. The real benefit is the "edges" of the paper. Being able to click on an icon and get automatic headers and a citation builder is well worth the little bit of money the software cost.

Something else, if you are focusing on doing everything perfectly, sometimes you miss the forest for the trees. Some things need to be done exactly--for instance you want to keep sterile procedures sterile--but there is a lot that falls under the art of nursing. Working with humans can be pretty messy sometimes; both metaphorically and literally. Keeping things fluid and going with the flow will sometimes get you better results than trying to do everything "right".

I don't even write in full sentences in my charting narrative, lol. But I do currently use APA format in my MSN program and did through nursing school as well. With the proper software (PERRLA) it's a breeze. You can focus on your writing instead of the format. The downside to APA, I've found, is that the capitalization of every word in a title now looks all kinds of wrong .

I don't know that bleach would have been necessary with MRSA/VRE exposure. We use bleach for C. Dif, but not the others.

Wow, y'all must have incredible time management skills to be able to plan to the minute the next time you will be in to check on each patient. I'm sure that's a testament to your wonderful managers...

umcRN, have you had any problems with cooling on ECMO?