"Know it all"? or perform one role?

Specialties Ob/Gyn

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Specializes in Ante-Intra-Postpartum, Post Gyne.

I have noticed that it seems as though many hospitals are different regarding the set up of their L&D units. I did a rotation at a hospital where the nurses performed all roles; they had antepartum, postpartum, and new babies all on the same shift...while other hospitals have antepartum/labor and deliver nurses, nursery/nicu nurses, and postpartum nurses as separate roles.

Which way is your hospital set up and are you:

1. rural (communities having less than 20,000 residents or fewer than 99 persons per square mile)

2. Urban (non rural and having a higher population density more than 99 persons per square mile; cities with a population of at least 20,000 but less than 50,000)

3. Metropolitan (densely populated county with more than 1 million inhabitants)

this is for a school paper so I will be grateful if you can answer! thanks in advance

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Specializes in ICU, Telemetry.

Rural: our L/D nurses do it all. We don't have a separate peds unit, either, and I've actually discharged a 9 year old and had a 102 year old in the bed 2 hours later. I've told them, I just don't have the experience to feel comfortable with babies, and luckily, I haven't had one yet.

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typed in error---sorry!!

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Metropolitan:

Our L&D nurses dont touch babies.

We have nursery nurses who attend all deliveries for the babies only.

We have mother-baby nurses who take care of the couplet after recovery.

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Very rural - 3000 or so people.

We do it all.

steph

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Specializes in Psych, ER, OB, M/S, teaching, FNP.

My community is rural, actually frontier per the census. Last night I had a 16 y/o in labor, serveral med/surg type pts, a 10 y/o ER hold over suicide attempt, 29 y/o MVC DUI that had an aortic separation that way waiting to be flown out to a trauma center.

In rural not only do you do L/D, PP and Nursery, you do chest pain/MI and traumas in the ER, ICU pts on a vent, peds, M/S and even OR for the c-secs.

We have no pharmacy so mix all our own meds too.

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Specializes in Ante-Intra-Postpartum, Post Gyne.
My community is rural, actually frontier per the census. Last night I had a 16 y/o in labor, serveral med/surg type pts, a 10 y/o ER hold over suicide attempt, 29 y/o MVC DUI that had an aortic separation that way waiting to be flown out to a trauma center.

In rural not only do you do L/D, PP and Nursery, you do chest pain/MI and traumas in the ER, ICU pts on a vent, peds, M/S and even OR for the c-secs.

We have no pharmacy so mix all our own meds too.

wow, you REALLY do it all:yeah::bowingpur

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1. rural (communities having less than 20,000 residents or fewer than 99 persons per square mile)

2. Urban (non rural and having a higher population density more than 99 persons per square mile; cities with a population of at least 20,000 but less than 50,000)

3. Metropolitan (densely populated county with more than 1 million inhabitants)

You've got quite a gap there between populations of 50,000 and a million. There are quite a few cities that would fall somewhere in between those two numbers.

I work in a busy metro hospital that delivers approx 5,000 babies a year. We have separate antepartum, L&D, and postpartum units. There is no well-baby nursery, per se. We do couplet care and have a nursery with PCA staffing at night.

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My community is rural, actually frontier per the census. Last night I had a 16 y/o in labor, serveral med/surg type pts, a 10 y/o ER hold over suicide attempt, 29 y/o MVC DUI that had an aortic separation that way waiting to be flown out to a trauma center.

In rural not only do you do L/D, PP and Nursery, you do chest pain/MI and traumas in the ER, ICU pts on a vent, peds, M/S and even OR for the c-secs.

We have no pharmacy so mix all our own meds too.

You just described where I work! Except we have pharmacy from 8-3.

steph

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Specializes in Community, OB, Nursery.

I'd call it urban (400,000 people). Or does 400k make you metropolitan?

We do about 6000 - 8000 deliveries per year. L and D is their own unit, NICU is their own unit as well. Stable antepartums, mother-baby, and nursery is all one unit and we are all crosstrained within that.

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Specializes in Ante-Intra-Postpartum, Post Gyne.

Thanks for all the replies so far!:up::wink2:

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Specializes in Rural Health.

75,000+ metro population in the area in which I work.

We do it all. You might labor a patient one shift, next shift take care of her PP and the next shift take care of her baby in the nursery if it's gone to Level II status. You just never know what you'll do when you come to work.

We are a small OB unit in comparison to our competition and counterparts. There are 6 hospitals in the area that deliver babies. We deliver 70 or so babies a month.

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