LPNmorse

Hey all! I'm starting RN to BSN at ULL on May 2nd. This thread has been a wealth of knowledge for me to start planning out my next year with this program. Anyone able to share a syllabus for 354 so I can start reading the text and brainstorming for the papers? Email [email protected]

Holy crap if this is easy then the nurses during my hospital shifts must have been dreaming! 2.5 years corrections here, it's harder cause 'malingering' is never a word anyone wants to say out loud.

Barely a nurse for 2.5 years and completely with this Dr. by my side and he actually had the nerve to stop and say "are you ok right now?" considering my overload, q15mins vitals, 16+ pt overload, and running ship for myself with little help I said "no, doc not really, but I have 2 hours left on my shift to fulfill my duties for you" given the man is 75 years old and taking a full work shift and on-call shifts every other week, who am I to tell him no? It was a very meaningful gesture on his part to ask after realizing the amount of new stress admits can have. I learned that everyone can have a breaking point and I'll be damned the 75 year old doctor is more akeen to my stress than the 25 year olds running the unit.

NCCHP states that sick call is valid when an 'actual' symptom is reported. Lots of these would be thrown to the side or asked to re-instate what their issue was if your facility followed those standards. I love the ones in spanish from guys I have been speaking english to for the past 3 months during med pass. I confronted one guy and he just exclaimed "I can speak it but can't read it nurse, hullloooo!" Put me for a loop that day :)

In psychiatric facilities you can actually open up those areas of therapeutic communication and work on fixing people. In corrections it is not always as simple in that many incarcerated have ulterior motives for their actions and it adds another level to trying to achieve patient goals in that setting. Not saying it can't be done but it should be taken much more lightly and seriously those cases.

RN's at my job do a lot of the intake side. So that means you are the FIRST person to see the inmates being brought in (oh joy!). Your orientation should better suit you for what you need and don't need. The first day I may bring a lunch (with no tin foil, cans, silverware, metal etc.) or you will be excused to eat out of the facility for lunch if not able to eat in. No phones, umbrellas either as you are now in a contraband area (I actually enjoy the fact I get cut off from the world 12 hours a day). If you can wear any type of scrubs the first day rather than street clothes then do it! Basically ask your orientation person if you can scrub up and bring the basic pens/stetho for the first day and you should be good! My facility uses very small alcohol pads for insulin/injection etc. and we have non-alcohol based hand sanitizer in the cubex. Get used to every little thing possible being stored in a secure location.

I have been working at a county correctional facility for about 3 weeks now as an LPN. I work 7am-7pm shift, the first thing in the morning is passing meds. Some lockdown units are approved for pre-packaging meds (which is awesome cause it's so much quicker and sometimes it can get LOUD in there). I pass meds for about 150-200 patients. I try to get my daily BP checks done at this time as well and COWS/CIWA if the chronic care nurse is not doing them that day. I am usually done by 12 when I come back and get my sick calls and PPD placements (maybe 4-8 sick calls and 0-12 PPD's). I try to take lunch and look over my sick calls so I have an idea of what I'm assessing for each patient. The sick calls are usually "my back hurts" "I have a rash on ...." "I woke up with chest pain" or "I need to see a dr." where we just have to go and find out the issue and report back, put them on a protocol med (like tylenol for pain or MOM for constipation), this is also the time I do a few 2pm meds and any wound care (usually just a bandage change though I had a new inmate with infected stitches I refused to touch and sent him down to medical instead). I try to get done with all of that by 3ish so I can jump at the PA or MD before they leave and get any orders from them or just go over a few of the sick calls together. After that it's catch-up time, charting, stocking the med-cart, and just getting ready to do accuchecks at 5pm which can be 5-15 patients. Usually I'm done by 6 and just finish up charting and going over everything that happened for the day with my supervisor and doing little house-keeping stuff in the pharmacy area. Throughout all of this you may have an inmate in the ERC chair that you are doing strap checks on every 2 hours, running to a man-down code, doing a segregation check for new inmates to lockdown etc. so being organized and giving yourself time to complete everything is crucial for success.

We can also get them for a street charge as long as they are OUT of their room, otherwise that is considered their place of residence and has some level of privacy attached. The lockdown units are the worst cause of the type of people and how they stand at the window jerking while the nurses are passing meds or doing sick calls. I get in and out as quick as possible, try to keep my back to the wall or hide behind pillars to block view from the repeat jerking offenders, never make eye contact, and don't look when they start calling "nurse, nurse, NURSE!" I stay turned away and just answer "Yes sir?" or their name if I know it so that I am still acknowledging them if it is truly a medical issue and not them just trying to get me to look at them jerking off to my back. When I was in training we had a guy with his door open standing on the top bunk on the 2nd level with his junk in his hand while we were doing med pass on the lower level. The CO still threatened him about getting the charge (even though he was in his room and we actually couldn't do anything) and he started crying and we haven't had a repeat offense from him since.