Skilled care facilities can be a viable option for newer nurses that are looking to increase their clinical skills. This article discusses some of the good things about a skilled care experience, and why it could be a viable option for a nurse looking to increase a skill set.
There are a number of different types of skilled care facilities. Generally speaking, skilled care can be defined as a long term care facility which houses non medically acute patients, that do have medical needs that need to be maintained on a long term basis.
Skilled care residents are all ages, come from all walks of life. They all have a story. Some more complicated than others. Skilled nursing is a passion. There are nurses who will tell you that they can't imagine doing anything else, but have the ability to if needed. Skill care nurses have the ability to take anything that comes out of or goes into a resident--any tube, any wire, any drain, anything--and make it work. Not only literally, but for the needs of the resident as well.
A number of skilled care facilites are amazing in the care that they provide. In the activities that the residents participate in. Of the ability to help a resident reach a higher level of functioning. What it can provide a nurse is the ability to hands on be able to maintain a number of clinical appliances that the resident needs to survive. Many skilled care facilities work with very little. It teaches a nurse to be innovative and think outside the box. Which can only help critical thinking skills in the long run.
If one is interested in mental health, residents who are brain injured takes a special type of theraputic communication. It takes a nurse who thinks on her feet. To assess issues before it becomes an even larger issue. It is something one loves or hates, but is a good way to think about communication and barriers to learning.
Many skilled care residents have trachs. This is something that again one loves or hates. However, a trach is something that a nurse should know how to care for and assess properly. Skilled care is a great way to learn this. When you are talking about using less to obtain optimal results, this is an "art" that is best learned with a number of patients over a long term.
A number of patients have some sort of feeding tube. This is interesting as they get both feedings and meds in this tube. It is always a good thing to be able to assess the site, the tube, and the function of same appropriately. Nurses who have been in skilled care for a long time, and it is a passion for some nurses, can show you things that are pretty amazing about those tubes. How to get them to function. How to make a patient comfortable with their tube.
Skilled care allows residents, to the best of their ability, to be involved in their own care. They allow them to be present and as active as they can be. There's a number of groups--resident advisory boards to Bingo to dances--that attempt to make life at least varied. From what I have seen, it is not all about in the bed 24/7/365 just get up on holidays kind of a place. Residents have a "life" and the nurses who care for them help them to live it to the fullest.
Skilled care is a viable option to seek employment. A nurse will get much more of an education than one would initially suspect. A nurse gets to work with a varied group of people, all ages, all functional levels, and help them to live their lives despite the bells, whistles and wires. In my opinion, it is an intensely gratifying form of nursing.
SNF's are nothing more over crowded glorified med-surg graveyards. I love how every now and then someone writes an article painting them as a great opportunity. Well; someone's got do it. Yes, there are probably a few out there there don't run the RN ragged with a ridiculous census, but few and far between. Just my opinion...
SNF's are nothing more over crowded glorified med-surg graveyards. I love how every now and then someone writes an article painting them as a great opportunity. Well; someone's got do it. Yes, there are probably a few out there there don't run the RN ragged with a ridiculous census, but few and far between. Just my opinion...
As a student, I thought I couldn't have gotten a better hands on clinical skill experience anywhere. But that's just me. And like everything else, there's the good and the not so good faciilities. Most employ LPN's. And rumor has it that the RN is run ragged with a ridiculous census just about everywhere.
As a student, I thought I couldn't have gotten a better hands on clinical skill experience anywhere. But that's just me. And like everything else, there's the good and the not so good faciilities. Most employ LPN's. And rumor has it that the RN is run ragged with a ridiculous census just about everywhere.
Try doing it everyday with a real load...
ChelseaHindwood
8 Posts
Actually you are right i skilled person has better level of treatment and knows exactly what the problem is, he can better cure this instead of anyone else. I agree with you the whole article is quite informative and we need to understand these things for our own care otherwise we will be in danger.