UGH!!!!! V ent: Finding charts

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UGH!!! I just have to vent. It is SO AGGREVATING to go down to the clinical site (one half hour EACH WAY) from my house just to not find my patient's chart or to realize that someone else has it. I know everyone has a job to do and I am the last priority and that is fine but TWICE this week, this has happened. I have clinical tomorrow and will just have to go in early to get the information (which will only take me about 5 minutes)! Anyone else have this problem? How do you get your patient's information beforehand? Or would you sit and wait for hours on end to get the chart?

Specializes in Med/Surg, Academics.

We were told to never go in at shift change because it's too chaotic, and the charts are being used by the people who need them.

On that note, I cannot fathom why any nursing instructor requires the complete care plan from the chart BEFORE any assessments are done. I don't think nurses do that in the real world so why the hell do some schools expect that in NS? I'm glad that mine doesn't.

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Specializes in Emergency Dept. Trauma. Pediatrics.
We were told to never go in at shift change because it's too chaotic, and the charts are being used by the people who need them.

On that note, I cannot fathom why any nursing instructor requires the complete care plan from the chart BEFORE any assessments are done. I don't think nurses do that in the real world so why the hell do some schools expect that in NS? I'm glad that mine doesn't.

We didn't do careplans before hand, but we had to do patient research before hand. We had these sheets to fill out. We had to pick our patients and basically put their history, all their labs, drugs, patho phys of their history, their ambulation and diet, past surgeries etc. etc. They take a good amount of time to find everything. We only leave the assessment part blank to do that when we got on shift. We did them so that we really had a good idea about our patient before we started care.

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Specializes in Med/Surg, Academics.
We didn't do careplans before hand, but we had to do patient research before hand. We had these sheets to fill out. We had to pick our patients and basically put their history, all their labs, drugs, patho phys of their history, their ambulation and diet, past surgeries etc. etc. They take a good amount of time to find everything. We only leave the assessment part blank to do that when we got on shift. We did them so that we really had a good idea about our patient before we started care.

We get that stuff the night before, too. I go to the hospital about four hours after shift change, and I've been able to keep the chart for the time it takes me to gather the info. It's also during the evening, when there are very few docs, consults, and techs who need the chart.

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Specializes in Emergency Dept. Trauma. Pediatrics.
We get that stuff the night before, too. I go to the hospital about four hours after shift change, and I've been able to keep the chart for the time it takes me to gather the info. It's also during the evening, when there are very few docs, consults, and techs who need the chart.

For our LTC clinicals where they had paper charts, we didn't have to do it before hand, we picked whoever the previous week and did the paperwork on our down time.

At the hospital I am on night clinicals and we would start around 1, so I would just go in a couple hours early and snag a computer and do it then.

I have a make up clinical tomorrow which will be day shift (starting at 6:45) so I have to go in tonight to get my pt. info. Not looking forward to it. I wish they had evening make up days also but so far our school hasn't.

Their were always computers available. The docs had their own sets of computers and the hard copy charts to that they wrote they progress notes in. Because of this, thankfully, getting a computer to get all your pt. research and info done was never a problem.

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Specializes in NICU.

I wouldn't mind having night clinicals occasionally. I'm most likely going to start out working nights, so I'd like to get an idea of how those shifts feel and flow

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Specializes in Emergency Dept. Trauma. Pediatrics.

I love it. We got off at 11:30 and had pre conference before we got on the floor instead of post. We got on the floor at 3. But I loved doing evenings. I was so happy I got one of the slots because only 8 students had. First semester having to be there by quarter to seven was grueling. I am NOT a morning person.

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