Kaylight

No. I am an ARNP student as well looking for preceptors in the Tacoma Area. I did find a good website. She has loads of information on there. https://www.melissadecapua.com/your-guide-to-finding-an-NP-preceptor/

Did you ever find a preceptor near Olympia? Have you tried Tacoma?

I was wondering how it compares with Med-Surg. It sounds like it could be fast paced since the patient only stays 24 hours, but they don't have the patient load that Med-Surg has. My med-surg unit can discharge two-three patients, and get back that many patients from the ED sometimes all at once. Thanks everyone for responding.

I just got offered a night position in a cardiac short stay unit. I am currently in a non-tele med-surg unit, and I would like someone to tell me what a short stay unit is like. I am wondering how different it is from what I do currently. Thanks.

I just had this happen last night. It is usually an older "more experienced" nurse who does this. They want to simply look at the notes and don't care about my experience with the patient. I find this arrogant, but I am not sure what to do about it. I guess if they know so much, I'll just stop talking.

I work on a corona unit that is a combination of Med-Surg, PCU, and ICU all in one unit. All of ours are positive except that we did have one guy come in for a heart attack (the unit was previously a coronary unit), and he was tested for Covid. He had some symptoms, but we weren't sure yet. They did use PPE because they weren't sure. We had one negative test, but we try to get them off the floor as soon as possible. Normally if we have someone who has lowered WBC's or immune compromised they are placed on neutropenic precautions, which means they wouldn't have live flowers, and fresh fruit. I sometimes wear a mask to protect them from me.

Our governor was begging for nurses to come to Washington State to work not volunteer. I am still helping nurses orient on the floor.

Governor Inslee indicated that although private companies are gearing up to manufacture PPE, and ventilators, they are also charging exorbitant prices for these items. The governors are trying to get Trump to use his power to lower the prices on these items. The reason that some countries' death toll is higher is because their hospitals are overrun. If they are overrun then the normal crew of chronically ill patients will be bypassed. Only the very ill will be treated, and thus the death toll for all illnesses will go up. The point of keeping the curve down is to prevent a run on hospitals. Right now my hospital has low census (or did), and this is probably people staying away from the hospital. Some of these people will inevitably die at home. Some scientists have claimed that people stayed away from the hospital during the Ebola epidemic as well.

Yes. I agree. We actually have a relatively small ICU, and we will need to train Med-Surg nurses in critical care in order to handle the situation. Nurses need to be trained in handling respiratory distress at least.

Our hospital is locking down visitation. One visitor per patient in a 24 hour period. Each visitor has their temperature checked. We have Covid-19 patient in the ICU, and another floor is being designated for Covid patients. The hospital has created a regional pool of nurses to prevent overworking of the nurses. I have already worked with a Covid rule out patient, and I tested him. Fortunately, he was negative. They only had droplet protection on Covid patients at the time, and we had to reuse our one droplet mask all day.

I have been bullied multiple times. One job that I worked at was notorious for bullying. The whole hospital was toxic, and at my new job I have a charge nurse that likes to make my life miserable. It happens. Some hospitals are more toxic than others.

I am a new grad also working on a med-surg floor, and I hate it. It seems I am overloaded with work, and the charge nurse gives me the difficult patients all the time. If I am drowning she just glares at me and says that I am expected to take 5 patients no matter what their acuity is. I don't get breaks, and sometimes don't get lunch. There seems to be some type of crazy thing going on all the time. I have been hit by a patient, and had an excessive number of psyche patients to deal with. Some of the charge nurses are bullies, and I am tired of working there already.

You are probably right about this. I did know another nurse who left the state hospital so that he could regain his acute care skills. I am afraid of being pigeon-holed, but I should hang in there a bit more. I can say that one good thing about my hospital is that it has a good balance between male/ female, and we have a very diverse team. I will say also that we have some very good techs, and some wonderful nurses who keep the milieu going. It's a bit more difficult on graveyard, but I might have the one person waking up who may need to speak to someone in the middle of the night. It does get very slow, and I feel like I don't have enough time for bedside care.

We are on guard. We have census every 15 minutes, and I am well aware that I am working in the most dangerous facility in my state. Yes. The techs have more contact with patients than I do. It does not mean that they get to insult me whenever they like, however.

We won't do those. We have a medical team that does this. It would be nice if we did though. The entire hospital is psyche. I would float to another psyche ward, possibly forensic.