Aunt Slappy

Give them some AMA paperwork and tell them if they're going to refuse all appropriate interventions for their condition, they may as well go home. That's my fever dream response, because I know no place would actually let you do that. Too bad though.

How new is this? Because in 2012 I worked a hospital telemetry unit as a CNA, and regularly had 13 patients assigned to me, 1/4 to 1/3 of them on some type of precaution. I'll never forget the night I came in and was told I was the ONLY CNA on the unit, for 17 or 18. Do you have a link to these mandatory staffing ratios from JCAHO?

Is there history that would justify her not being okay with you socializing with groups of women? If you have history of banging coworkers I can see her point. Is she usually insecure? Because if this is a known quantity with her, regardless of my opinion of that, you're purposely causing a problem if you know that and then plan an event like this. Especially in HER home. If there is no history that justifies her attitude, I think she's being fairly ridiculous, but only you know about that.

I recently left exactly that kind of job for one that has more flexibility even though it's still M-F. Example, I'm leaving an hour early tomorrow because of parent teacher conferences, and there is zero stress about it from my partner nurse and my boss. I worked longer days yesterday and today to flex the time so I'll still have 40 hours, and no use of PTO. It's a relief. At my last job if you didn't request time off at least 2 weeks in advance it would get denied, and even with 2 weeks or more notice, there was still no guarantee. The short answer is that you have to use PTO for every little thing, and bosses get cranky about time off because they have to cover the clinic.

If hospital is your goal, then pursue a BSN or whatever the Canadian equivalent is, because that is what hospitals want. As to hours, I actually felt I had a pretty decent work/life balance when I worked three 12s per week. I now work M-F with weekends and holidays off, and that has its own set of challenges but with older kids who go to school and are involved in activities, it works out okay for us. Stress is job dependent. I've had jobs that tore up my stomach, some that offered reasonable support along with a fair amount of stress, and now one that is super low stress. You just need to decide what you can accept and what you can't, and that will be a learning process for you. I don't think becoming a LPN is a mistake (obviously), but make sure it aligns with your goals.

The whole point of PRN, from the nurse's perspective, is the flexibility to choose when you want to work and not have to get approval for vacation, etc. You also get paid a higher hourly wage than regular employees. So, no, I don't think you need any differentials for working nights or weekends since you are literally choosing your own schedule. If you want the benefits of full time employment, then go get a full time job.

I voted that you should look for another LPN job first. You've only worked one place and one type of nursing. There are hundreds of ways to be a nurse. I've been a LPN for a bit more than 2.5 years and I just started my 4th job. Normally I wouldn't have that many in that short a time, but one went south super fast and super bad and I had to bail. The job I just left was a M-F clinic job where I stayed for 16 months. It wasn't terrible, I could've stayed longer, but there was some stuff I got tired of dealing with and a lateral transfer became available. I'm three weeks in, and I managed to land the most chill, low stress job I've ever had since I started working at 16. I can't believe they're paying me nursing wages. Keep looking around. You might find something awesome. And data entry by humans won't last many more years as a career, plus it will give you carpal tunnel syndrome.

You're going to learn a hard lesson about bad choices. Regularly working doubles while in school and only getting 3-4 hours of sleep on a regular basis is a recipe for disaster, and now it happened. Be grateful you didn't kill your patient, or someone on the road when you fell sleep driving. Allow this to teach you that you can't do everything all at once and you're going to have to make some sacrifices. Either you'll have to work fewer hours or cut school back to part time. If this is your first med error, hopefully you'll be given education and allowed to move on with your life. Is your facility the punitive type? Because if they are it could go anywhere from a write up to termination. Hopefully you don't work for a place that would do that. As to your license, one med error does not threaten it unless someone can prove fraud or diversion. My first year as a nurse I made two reported med errors, and both times I wrote an incident report, went over how to avoid it happening again, and then that was it.

This is just bias, plain and simple.

I've seen ER docs with full sleeves, doesn't seem to be holding them back. I've worked with tons of aides and nurses with visible tattoos and they're a non-issue. This may depend on where you live though. Mine isn't visible but I have plans for more that will be. My next one will be a religious symbol on my wrist and anyone that wants to have an issue with that can go take a long walk off a short pier.

Let us know when you have an update. I have never given and would never give notice at my job until I had a final offer and defined starting date in writing for the new one. I learned the hard way how quickly a verbal offer from an ADON can turn into "we've never heard of you, resubmit your application." I did not, by the way. If they had their heads that far up their butts, I didn't want to work there.

What on God's green earth made you think it was okay to give any liquid medication without measuring it? Do you think the prescribed dosage just doesn't matter? Are you unaware or just uncaring that you could cause respiratory depression and death with a narc overdose?

My first CNA job (at age 36) was in tele unit in a hospital. I got that job because I knew someone from my class who had been hired there. She had a friend who worked there and helped her get the job. Sometimes it really is about who you know. Reach out to your network, because you might know someone who knows someone.

This person doesn't seem to be much of a friend.

So true. I'm dying remembering the first time I did that. And it was Rocephin so it was a HUGE needle! Poor guy.