scootermcnutt

Just wanted input from other nurses on bowel care on post-op pts. Often, total hips. What I see most often are: bisacodyl tabs or supps, mom, colace or pericolace or fleets enemas or metamucil. Frankly, I'm never sure what to use when. If I get a post op, I generally order colace po bid right off the bat as prevention, but what next if it doesn't work? Or, what about when you come across a pt who is post-op day 3 or so and no one has started any bowel care, where do you start and how do you progress? I sort of fly by the seat of my pants and I need a better plan. Thanks.

Does anyone know of any white scrub pants that are not absolutely x-ratedly see-through? I like to sometimes wear white pants with a cute scrub top (I'm female) and I HATE how all my white pants you can see my panty line and the outline of the pockets of the pants. Any tips? I have the Cherokee ones. I know it's a dumb question, but what the hey.

I graduated June of 2000, so I've been at my job now just over a year in med surg. I felt like you in clinicals, and the same as you as I started my "real" job. It was very scary not to have a "real nurse" to defer to. I am it!! But after a year, I no longer panic before work. My confidence has come slowly but surely, and it's better to move slow and ask dumb seeming questions than to be over confident. I still have moments or entire shifts where I feel like a loser nurse, because I am just plain too busy to give the kind of care I want to, and sometimes the nurse coming on after me will ask questions during report that I cringe about because I should know!! But I catch other nurses oversights too, and I know we are just people doing the best we can. Just take your time with medication administration, so you can best avoid a med error. Keep an eye on vitals, especially if you have an aid doing them. Those two things will save you a lot of potential grief. Hang in there.

Thanks for all the tips, you all had great ideas. In a way I hope it's a long time till I have to deal with a tube again, but in another way I hope I get a patient with one tomorrow, you know? Thanks!

I floated the other night and had a patient with a j-tube, which I havn't dealt with since lab in nursing school. What is the best most basic routine for giving meds through the tube (they were suspensions) and what about all the flushing and such? He was on a pump for continuous feeding that did the flush automatically. What's different about a peg tube, which I also havn't dealt with.

I gave compazine last night by slow IV push to a nauseated patient. About 7 minutes later she was panicky, saying she felt afraid, wanted to rip her cast off and run, was afraid to stay at the hospital etc. Vitals were stable, O2 sat 97%, no chest pain or SOB, etc. Several nurses said this can happen occasionally with compazine. It also didn't help that she is prone to claustrophobia. The cast was making her feel confined (it wasn't too tight). Any info for me on this reaction?

I am feeling a little better. Last night was wildly busy too, but a better night overall. Not all nurses are the same...for some of us our personalities just don't handle stress as smoothly as others, but that doesn't mean we can't be an effective nurse. I do want to stay, I love being a nurse. I just feel like if I don't turn every patient every two hours, tend to all the details, I am letting the pt down.

I'm in tears. I've been an RN for 7 months and working in a hospital med-surg unit.On a good night it's great, but that's few and far between. On a bad night, like tonight, chronically short on CNA help etc., the stress is so bad for me. Tonight I had to send a pt to ICU, I literally NEVER caught up on charting, had blood to hang, etc, and never even peed until I was about to burst.So would I be a true failure if I decided that for me, the stress is too much?

I've had several patients with femoral nerve blocks post-op lateley. One was a one-time injection with the port left in, the other was a continuous drip on a pump. Anyone know of any special care or hints? Also, is removing these catheters a nursing task?

I did awesome in theory too, and yet clinicals petrified me! I did great, but noone knew the extent of anxiety I suffered as I drove home after every clinical time...did I miss something? Oh my gosh, what if... did I forget to... etc. I wound up on anxiety medication over it. I graduated June of 2000. I also have a harder time than some with critical thinking, and it doesn't "come natural" to me at all. But I am working in abusy hospital setting and doing great. I just have to be really organized and write everything down, and I am a very good nurse, I just have to work harder at it!! Best of luck.