straight caths and students

[adrienurse]

deleted

[caliotter3]

That facilitator may be taking her "hands off" attitude b/c she has too many students for her comfort level and she wants to personally supervise as much as possible. It would be good if she could be approached to have a better reliance on the unit personnel, but I suspect she is set in her ways.

At my school, our labs were almost a joke. I do not remember doing caths at all in lab. The local newspaper has done articles in the past trying to drum up sympathy for the program (BSN prog) and its failings d/t lack of money. I was not impressed, no excuses as far as I was concerned b/c during our final clinical experience we were given a document which was also given to our clinical preceptors specifically dictating that we did not have permission to do 8 different procedures, with or without direct supervision.

I did my first male straight cath at a home hlth visit, supervised by my preceptor, a wonderful nurse and teacher. I never did any female caths until I did them on the job where I was hired after getting my LPN license. Believe me, most of the nurses on this job (the ones who cared about anything) noticed that my BSN training was sorely lacking. How embarassing!

[meownsmile, BSN, RN]

I think its reasonable for the student to know how to do the procedure, but actually having done it is another thing altogether. Just like sterile technique, they are all taught but the senior student im precepting right now had a devil of a time getting through the sterile part of a central line change. She had to restart 3 times before i had to walk her through step by step the 4th time. It was the gloving she had trouble with. So yes,, let them do it,, but watch sterile techique closely.

I was nice about it,, but i bet she can do it right the first time now. LOL

[land64shark]

I'm in the 3rd semester of 4, ADN program. We learned foley's/ straight caths in our 2nd semester, but there were very few oportunities to practice insertions on the floor.

Our first two semesters were also very limited by our instructor; she needed to be with us for everything the first time we did it. We also only passed meds a couple of times. This third semester is very different. We've been turned loose. We can do most anything another RN is willing to show us and we give all meds except IV push. Actually, we see very little of our instructor.

[adrienurse, LPN]

deleted

[jimthorp]

I dont know if every state is the same but here in MN we had to pass our lab skills before they could be done on a patient. Of course we only had the dummies (no one would volunteer!) but if you didnt pass a skill by your third try you had to retake the whole class!

ROTFLMAO!

I don't remember what semester but I think it was the second of three for the PN program. Reasonable yes, as long as you have gone over it in lab.

I had one awesome clinical instructor in my final semester who would browse around the entire floor looking for skills on any patient. I was with a good group of students that rotation and we would all be trying to get dib's on the next Foley insertion.

[Gennaver, MSN]

Just wondering here and maybe you can help me cause it's been a while since I was a student. Is it reasonable to expect a second year (4 year degree) nursing student in their second semester to be able to perform a straight catheterization to obtain a urine sample? With supervision of course.

Hello,

I think that is a reasonable expectation, ~especially~ with supervision.

Now, if the student had issues with it or felt the need to be shown rather than supervised then, obviously she/he isn't confident enough yet, so in that case then, no it would not yet be reasonable.

Gen

p.s. I tend to disagree with UAP perfoming anything other than "clean technique"...my former employer used to have all the techs, (the aides) training in an hour long class to perfrom foley insertions...as a former UAP there are some of my previous coworkers that I would shudder if they inserted one in me or a loved one due to their lack of even clean technique!

[buddiage]

Just wondering here and maybe you can help me cause it's been a while since I was a student. Is it reasonable to expect a second year (4 year degree) nursing student in their second semester to be able to perform a straight catheterization to obtain a urine sample? With supervision of course.

I am in my 2nd semester and was just tested over it.

With supervision, why not? We are instructed to do it, sterile technique, and are not allowed to do anything like that without our instructor present, which is fine.

We were tested out on med pass/ injections last semester. Why not?

[nursenikki928]

i work in a ltc facility that is a clinical site for both lpn and rn students and they both insert foley caths and perform straight caths with supervision from their instructor.

[NeosynephRN]

We did foley's our first semester...man that seems like forever ago!! LOL!! I have gotten the chance to do a couple, but many fellow students have not gotten to do any. It is too bad that the teacher is not grasping at any opportunity for her students to learn, or too bad that she has too many students so that she does not feel comfortable!