What are your clinicals like?

Soliloquy, MSN, APRN, NP · Nov 29, 2011

I LOVE CLINICALS!!!!! I LOVE EM!

One thing I would recommend (because this has been really beneficial for me) is to read the charts of the patients. You learn about the labs, the normal values, the patient's history, how to write up nurses notes, everything is in those charts. So if you can get a hand on those, read 'em.

Seriously, every clinical I've done has been very different but do expect to ask a lot of questions and to not know everything and to at times feel like you should know more than you do. lol BUt it's so much fun!

I've worked on the Psych ward, oncology, the ER, and each floor has different...things for each student. Some floors require you give more attention to your patients than others, know, administer, and learn more narcotics than others, some floors require you help ambulate a patient.

Hope this helps!

:heartbeat

tintegrate · Nov 29, 2011

Wow, Prinie - sounds like you do get to spend a lot of time in hospitals and actually practice doing things....I guess my concern is when clinicals are focused in home-settings or community settings - and you clinical experience is more educational-- do you really get a chance to read over charts, etc..?

Are most of your clinicals in hospital settings or does your school also place you in a lot of Community-type settings?

Thanks,

kaydensmom01 · Nov 29, 2011

So far I am in my first semester of clinical in a nursing home. We are just finishing up and we have learned and practiced assessments, med passes, injections, some documentation and bathing. We look over our patient's charts each week and do a care plan and then memorize all of their meds if its our turn for med pass. The rest of our semesters will be in hospitals. I feel that I have learned a lot of skills from the nursing home.

ashleyisawesome, BSN, RN · Nov 29, 2011

im in a diploma program and 90% of my clinicals are in the hospital. we did a couple observation days as a school nurse, pediatric LTC, acute rehab, nursing home, perinatal center, low income clinics, and home health.. but our normal clinical days are usually in the hospital.

the community experiences and nursing homes are places you can learn a lot from but im sorry you havent gotten any real hospital experience. how far along are you? maybe they start you out like that and you move on to acute care later? seems odd to have no hospital experience at all.

OB-nurse2013, BSN, RN · Nov 29, 2011

I'm a second semester student in a BSN program. We don't have clinicals until our second semester. My clinical is at a local large hospital on med-surg unit. We do 1 to 2 assessments every clinical and chart it as well as do a careplan. So far I have passed med.'s-PO, through a PEG tube, and IM and subq injections, IV pushes, piggy-backs, started fluidsa nd changed tubing, removed IV's, Trach suctioning, bed baths, several wound dressing changes, blood glucose checks, watched a blood transfusion, straight cathed a pt., enema, and a central line dressing change. Thats all I can think of. I love my clinical and our instructor is beyond great, I really feel I've learned a lot.

tintegrate · Nov 29, 2011

Thanks ashleyisawesome. I am just beginning. It is a fast track BN Program(for people with a previous degree). So, based on information I have been told, it seems that there is a lack of access to hospital clinicals, and it sounds like a lot of time will be spent in community settings....May be due to the small size of this town. I think there is some hospital experience, yet it seems the bulk of the time will be spent in community settings. From what it sounds - it seems like especially in bigger cities, that there is more opportunity and access to hospital clinicals.... I guess I worry I wont have the foundation I need to get out there in the end, And it makes me wonder if I should be looking into changing schools.....Anyways, its great to hear about all of your experiences, and thank You kaydensmom01 - your experience makes me feel like I will learn what I need to in a community or nursing home setting, thanks...

ashleyisawesome, BSN, RN · Nov 29, 2011

well hopefully they work you up to more hospital experience. if your hospital exposure is minimal, i suggest you are assertive in these situations and gain all the knowledge and experience possible while you can.

is there only one hospital within 40 mins of your school? are there a lot of nursing programs in the area? sometimes there is a lot of competition for clinical placements among schools and its hard for them to find places to fit in their clinicals. the only reason i think i am able to get so much hospital time in is because my school is associated with the hospital and we get first pick of clinical sites over all the community colleges and universities in the area. its also a moderate sized city and our hospital system alone has 4 campuses.

good luck and take in as much as you can, your education is what you make of it!

akulahawkRN, ADN, RN, EMT-P · Nov 29, 2011

I'm about to finish my 1st semester. My experience has been pretty close to what kadensmom01 has done so far. All my time has been in an acute care facility. I do completely suggest that if you can get your hands on the patient's chart or get a chance to really review an EMR (if your facility uses those instead), do it. You'll get a very good idea of what goes in there, how to write it, and so on. You'll know what labs have been ordered, you'll see what meds have been ordered, and try to put the labs together with the patient's history and clinical course to date.

As to how we get to that point, we prepped on Wednesdays and got our care plans started. We then did patient care on Thursdays and Fridays, updating our care plan each day. Those completed care plans are due on the following Tuesday. We had to list all the meds and know at least something about the meds if we weren't giving them, and we had to know the meds we'd be giving if we were going to do a med pass with our instructor.

Soliloquy, MSN, APRN, NP · Nov 29, 2011

Wow, Prinie - sounds like you do get to spend a lot of time in hospitals and actually practice doing things....I guess my concern is when clinicals are focused in home-settings or community settings - and you clinical experience is more educational-- do you really get a chance to read over charts, etc..?
Are most of your clinicals in hospital settings or does your school also place you in a lot of Community-type settings?
Thanks,

When I did psych, it was connected to a hospital but was actually more community oriented and the doctors held on to the charts most of the time so we didn't really get to see the charts for long, had to just stay on the lookout. The aim was more to observe the disorders in action and learn how to communicate with the clients. It was more about nurse/patient interactions than about doing...nurse things. We didn't do any nurse things there at all actually.

It was good experience though.

At some point, do they allow you to do things like administer shots, put in catheters, etc as time goes on? Only one of our hospitals let us learn how to do IVs and that's in the ER so we built rapport with the instructor there and he lets us come whenever he's around so we can do more things.

Pneumothorax, BSN, RN · Nov 29, 2011

clinical for us: we are the PCT's & RN's ********. needless to say we get a lot of hands on experience and its great. The staff is great to so its not really a problem. but we do work our little butts off hahah.

tintegrate · Nov 29, 2011

Hmm Prinie -- those are good questions, I dont know yet, but now I know what to ask the clinical co-ordinator :) I guess I just need to be patient and find out....

Thanks everyone for your input, its been helpful.