We've got a thread for what we'd like to say to our patients ... now onto what we'd like to say to a few (not all) of some of our fellow nasty nurse co-workers -- and I'm not even including our CNA's here -- I'm talking our fellow colleagues in nursing -- you know the ones I'm talking about:
1. Could some of you just be HUMAN for one day and not be out to get your fellow co-workers for one minute? How about showing a bit of forgiveness, and not walk around threatening to "write him or her UP" for every little nit picky thing you can find. It can come to bite you right back in the butt SOMEDAY.
2. Try laughing. Try some humor. Try a personality. Don't glare. Smile. Don't think I don't notice your little darting glares you throw at me all day -- I see them, and they poison my day.
3. Your co-workers are NOT the whipping board for every little thing that is wrong with your life, your relationships, your health, your finances, and your "woe is me" life problems. Take care of those at HOME and stop bringing them to work. Stop talking about them at work -- I'm seriously not into hearing about it. I have my own very real problems, but I don't burden everyone else with them. Wouldn't dream of it. But you do.
4. Could you also try siding with your co-workers and stop butt kissing the management? It's so tacky to do -- and it shows. You have no idea how very much it shows.
5. Do your job. Do your paperwork. Just do what is your responsibility on YOUR shift. Please stop leaving everything for the next nurse to "clean up." Give the extra five minutes and please clean up that chart so me, the nurse following you, does not get dragged down for the next 2 hours trying to fix it.
6. Try looking out for your fellow co-workers, and just not so much yourself. Work CAN be fun. Work can be full of camraderie and good will -- if folks like you could just be cleared out and re-trained. Nursing COULD be so much different -- if you'd just get out of your other-destructive patterns.
I don't have as many years in nursing as i'm sure some of you do -- but I'd love to hear more... I hope to God I don't recognize myself in any of these comments, or ever will.
Stop calling in sick once a week. You leave the unit short and understaffed and we all suffer. If you are sick then fine, but if you really aren't sick then come to work.
Stop calling in sick once a week. You leave the unit short and understaffed and we all suffer. If you are sick then fine, but if you really aren't sick then come to work.
While we are the subject, dear Co-Worker, do you even really need this job? You call in so much I'm starting to think you don't. That's fine if you don't need the job, but I know 3 nurses/aides who are on the waiting list for nights...please resign so a deserving individual who WON'T leave us shortstaffed can come onto the shift.
How about doing your job instead of sucking up to the boss. Your lips are on the bosses backside so much that it's becoming an infection control issue.
how about doing your job instead of sucking up to the boss. your lips are on the bosses backside so much that it's becoming an infection control issue.
[To my co nurses at the desk (not you V ) when I ask what hall that light is on I already know its not on my hall. Its just a little hint...
To the nurse that signed orders for a medication that doesn't exist (tylenol with codeine 5/325) . If I call you to ask about it /clarify it , please understand that saying "I must have signed nurse Mary's orders by mistake. " doesn't get you off the hook. You signed it,You need to fix it. To all the nurses who gave narco5/325 and signed for tylenol with codeine 5/325 Way To Go.
Please don't tell me my patient must have "knocked out his IV" when I ask you where the IV site you charted is. He's 80, has alzheimer's and is bedridden, so if he "knocked out his IV" please explain to me how he managed to get out of bed, briskly walk past the nurses station to the wound care cart, get a bandaid and cotton ball for the site, and thoughtfully leave the catheter by the sink before putting himself back to bed.
If you're going to lie to me, try to make it realistic.
Yeah, I'm a new nurse. Yes, I know you said that "it shows" but I'm not sure what such a comment accomplishes. I mean, weren't you also new once? Or, were you born out of your mother's womb a nurse? I guess you must have been, or you wouldn't be so smug.
Whatever -- so I ask "newbie" questions. I'm just trying to learn. If I don't ask questions, I also get my butt kicked, so I'm asking the *******' questions!!!
Yeah, I'm a new nurse. Yes, I know you said that "it shows" but I'm not sure what such a comment accomplishes. I mean, weren't you also new once? Or, were you born out of your mother's womb a nurse? I guess you must have been, or you wouldn't be so smug.
Whatever -- so I ask "newbie" questions. I'm just trying to learn. If I don't ask questions, I also get my butt kicked, so I'm asking the *******' questions!!!
Geez, I'm damned if I do, damned if I don't.
Part of the problem with the nursing profession as a whole, is that those that have been RNs/LPNs/LVNs for a long time forget what it is like to be a newbie.
For instance, feeling freaked out over having to do something for the first time withut your clinical instructor, the OMG-real-world-shock of nursing when you realize that anything and everything you do for or to a patient affects that person, and his/her family and the awesome responsibility that comes with that. I hate to say it, but so many of us get jaded with that, and just do our job--without maybe realizing what it is exactly that made us want to get here in the first place.
I don't think questions are stupid in any way, shape or form, but to whom are you asking these questions? Some folks have the patience to answer them and others don't and shouldn't be anywhere near a newbie, since they will probably help to drive that person out of the profession and will never once acknowledge that they have done so.
So, SoundofMusic, what are your questions? As a suggestion, research online and in your textbooks and look at the reference manuals at work. Come up with some answers of your own to your questions and have someone look them over and give you some guidepoints. Keep a cheat sheet on your patients (name, DOB, major meds/dxs, changes in status, etc) and refer to it.
Remember that you are in the process of becoming a nurse, and also that it will continue for as long as you are in the profession. Always ask questions, always be interested in learning, and be willing to grow and to encounter some bumps along the way. If you hold onto these, you will make a great nurse.
squeakykitty
934 Posts
If I get a write-up, it will be because of something I did or did not do.
It will not be because of someone lying about what I did or did not do.