Hi I am a new grad and have been working on the tele floor for about 4.5 mos. The other day ER sent up a patient with COPD exacab., who was on nonrebreather 100% 02. patients heart rate was 120's at admission to our floor. 02 sats were ok 93% but you could see patient was using accesary muscles paged DR for orders no call back page Dr again no call back. Patients heart rate was steadily climbing I decided to call a rapid response. They stabilized the patient and I was told there were not enough ICU nurses to take care of the patient. I had 3 other patients at this time and I had spent 2 hours in this patients room. Dr had called back during the rapid response ( patients hr had gone up to 170's but the monitor was reading 220). Then Dr alled back and ordered stat ABG's patients PH 7.14 and C02 was like 100 finally they transferred to ICU. Where the patient should have gone in the first place.
Then yesterday I had 6 patients. One was on the call light constantly for pain meds, I was in her room at least 10 or more times. The other patient Dr decided to cardiovert in room. I was in her room for an hour setting up and recovering. Then another patient complained of pain gave Dilaudid, ( which patient had taken before) about 2 hours later patient complained of Nausau gave Anzemet. Patient had had a CABG x3 about a month ago, came in with difficulty breathing and leg swelling. He was a diabetic bs were 177,176 on my shift. Well as I was trying to start a bad IV on another patient Dr ordered pacer wires out on yet another patient. This was at 1445 my shift was supposed to be over at 1530. and I had only charted on two of my six patients. Well I was trying to wrap up a few things on my other patients and then I was planning on pulling pacer wires and then chart. Well the above mentioned gentleman was found unresponsive in the room. We called the operator to call a rapid response and the operator wasn't picking up so we called a code. well they worked on him for quite a while I froze and the Er doc screamed at me. ( I am not ACLS certified yet) I was going to take the class in the spring. I ended up in the hallway crying. we dont have enough support on our floor my manager is leaving in the middle of Jan the prior manager walked off the job. I just found this out yesterday and two of our nurses have left in the past 2 weeks ( one had been there over 10 years)/ Needless to say I did not pull the pacer wires. My manager told me not to. So the nurse today will probably be mad. I ended up punching out at 1745 over two hours after my shift. I was going to try and stay on this floor for two years to get the experience. Dont know if I can do it any suggestions?