1st nursing job, Do I disclose condition?

[Loxam10]

Hello all. Hoping someone could give me a little bit of advice. I graduated in December and recently passed my boards. I am over the moon thrilled that my first nursing jobs looks like it will be in a pediatric OR. This is the job I have been dreaming of! I shadowed yesterday and everything looks like I will get the job (the manager said I will hear from HR next week.)

So heres my dilemma.. I have had CRPS in my arm for 13 years now (I am 25), I have learned ways to deal with the pain and be able to get my work done. A year ago I found a treatment that has kept me off of pain medications. I get a ketamine treatment once a month and everything is good in the world. The position I will get getting is 11a-2330p but I will be on orientation from 7a-1530p five days a week for almost a year. Which leaves me no time to get my treatment.. According to my friend that works there we get 8 hours of PTO every two weeks. But would it look bad if in my first months of employment I was using PTO once a month?

Do I be honest and talk to the manager, explain the situation, and hope she understands? Or do I just take the PTO once a month and not explain why? If I do disclose my CRPS do I do it in the pre-employment testing or do I wait until I actually have the job?

Any advice would be great! Thank you..

[BeachsideRN, ASN]

Rather than talking to your manager I would do a little research, there is likely someone in HR that deals with disabilities and chronic medical issues of employees. That is who I would talk to as that person typically has to maintain confidentiality and can give you info of how to move forward.

[guestng82]

Do you have to fill out an employment questionnaire that asks for your medical conditions, etc? If so, and you do not disclose your condition, in some states, that will mean that you can be denied worker's compensation benefits if any problems should arise related to your condition.

[NurseGirl525, ASN, RN]

Heathermaizey- that's what I am afraid of. My last two semesters in nursing school I had a clinical instructor who found out and made my life miserable. She basically told me I was wasting my time and I would never make it as a nurse. I think I am gun shy about talking to management because of it. You would think people in the medical field would understand people having medical conditions but unfortunately not .

I always think that also. You would think people in the medical field would understand but they do not. My medical history is a mess. I have epilepsy. I have not had a seizure in 4 1/2 years. But I remember going through the time when no one knew what was happening to me and I was almost fired from a job because of how it was affecting me. Then I had just started a job and I ended up with gastropariesis. I vomited all of the time and it made it impossible for me to work. I was able to take an 8 week leave to try and get better, and when I returned I had lost so much weight and was so weak, it was difficult. They were not nice to me when I came back and tried to get me to quit. It was awful.

Now, after years of hospitalizations and trying different meds for everything, I am finally healthy. My conditions are in remission. It could be because I haven't worked in almost 10 years. But I'm not a person that can just stay at home. I need to be doing something. I'm not a lazy person. I just had some really bad luck with my health. But I know that just as everything is in remission right now, it all could come flooding back. That is what I am afraid an employer will think if I disclose anything. I'm a great employee. I never call off, I work extra, and I am a team player. But I think my health would overshadow all the good things I could offer a company. That's why I think your physician will work with you. They know how it is. Mine has been great. He gives me his full support in me becoming a nurse.

[GuEsT78]

[COLOR=#000000]My last two semesters in nursing school I had a clinical instructor who found out and made my life miserable. She basically told me I was wasting my time and I would never make it as a nurse.

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[COLOR=#000000]She is wrong. Illnesses can make people better nurses.

I had several patients with anorexia nervosa that left me frustrated because to me their behavior made no sense. They were little more than skin and bones, and yet for lunch they'd request nothing but a green salad without dressing and skim milk. I felt like screaming at them "Eat! You've got to eat!" Fortunately, there was a rule in place that we weren't to talk with them about their central obsession, food. I kept my mouth shut, which was good.

On the other hand, one of the nurses I was working with was much more understanding. She told me that when she was their age she had been bulimic. She understood them. I never did.

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John Kennedy was less impressive in his character than many then and now believe. But there was one area where his behavior was exemplary. As a child, he was afflicted by the then-little-understood Addison's disease. Even his father's great wealth could not come up with a treatment that worked. I once read an account by a friend that must have been in the 1950s. Then Senator JFK was hospitalized and in a nearby room was a child sick like he'd been sick as a child. JFK spent quite a bit of time talking with the child and his parents. What surprised that friend was that, contrary to almost everything else that JFK did, there was no political angle. He was helping that child because he wanted to help that child. He'd been there and understood.

In my case, for a time I wondered why I adapted so quickly and well to caring for children with leukemia. After all, like most people today, before getting the assignment I'd not had any experience with being around much less caring for dying children. Yet within hours of starting, I felt like I was meant to be there.

Then I realized that I had an experience with a dying child. When I was about five, I'd watched a cousin waste away and die of cystic fibrosis. I remember being very angry at that time and it must have affected me much more deeply than I realized. That anger transformed into a desire not to see such things happen to other children. That led me to fight tooth and nail for their lives on Hem-Onc.

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[COLOR=#000000]I'm not one of those who believes you can't treat badly sick people without having been badly sick yourself. As humans we do have an ability to think outside ourselves and our self-interests. But I do believe having been through rough times with our own healths helps us understand and respond with more sympathy. For instance, if we've battled with the discipline require to deal with a chronic illness, we're less inclined to deal with a child battling juvenile arthritis with a demand that they "Just do their exercises and get well"—much like I wanted to tell those girls with anorexia nervosa to just eat more. We know it's not that simple.

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[MunoRN, RN]

Even if ketamine does show up on a drug screen you do not need to disclose to your employer. Drug screens are monitored off site and if something pops positive the medical review officer will notify you and you have a period of time (usually 48-72 hours) to send them proof of a valid Rx from the pharmacy or physician at which point the MRO will mark the screen as negative since you have a valid RX.

Employers are free to test for both prescribed and non-prescribed drug use; if they can argue that a medication can affect your ability to do your job safely then they can screen for it, prescription or not. Ketamine is well within the boundaries of a medication that could affect job performance and safety.