Alright, friends. I'm keeping this one short and sweet because my brain is sore and my dog is annoying.
This week, I have learned....
1. There should be a time limit hospitals should have to fix a problem. If things aren't better after, say, 15 days, let someone else try.
2. I'm in the mid Atlantic of the US with spring travel plans to Florida, and I'm actually feeling nervous about Zika. I had a guillian barre syndrome patient in nursing school. On his way driving home from work, his chest felt off, so he course corrected to the ED. When he pulled up and walked to the doors, he struggled with leg weakness. After he was done in triage, he couldn't stand. He was intubated, and completely paralyzed, before he left the ED for ICU.
3. A patient on neuroleptics will still have detectable epileptiform patterns on an EEG.
4. A good neurologist knows no matter how crazy the patient sounds describing symptoms, what they say is legit and will stay the course for diagnosis.
5. My favorite doctors to work with are the ones who will sit and talk patho with a nurse and enjoy that the nurse legitimately loves to learn.
6. Sliding scale coverage alone for inpatient management is not currently supported by research.
7. If working day shift doesn't eventually make me check into a psych ward, nothing will.
8. The GI doc who left me scrambling to save a guy's life (what felt like) single-handedly by doing no intervention before he got dumped on us (actively bleeding out 2 points of hemoglobin over 8 hours and maintaining a BP that won't leave 70s-80s) has suddenly become cautious enough to send a perfectly stable (hemodynamically, symptomatically, and on CBC) rectal bleed to ICU before meeting or scoping her after I've literally done all the work needed on her for the shift. And of course, I was rewarded with an end of the shift admission.
9. The Florida Man Collective has evolved to include its latest - Wrinkles the Clown. He is a scary-looking clown who is for hire to scare anyone you want, for any reason.
10. The more you annoy the doctor about the same thing, over and over and over, the more likely it is they will listen and maybe put in an order.
I have nothing else right now. My broken brain is feeble!
I agree. I've never worked with an NP I didn't both like and respect.
(I suspect that may change a bit after the new going straight through to NP programs let out their newly minted NPs.)
One of the NPs at the facility has a solid clinical grounding (she worked ICU for many years before becoming an NP). We occasionally butt heads just the least little bit, especially when she obsesses about BP management for Hospice patients, but I like her.
There's another one who chose her program because it was online, didn't require defending a Master's thesis, and I seriously suspect she went straight from her BSN program to NP school with little or no bedside nursing under her belt. She makes at least twice what I do (which I know is neither here nor there, but she wasn't even BORN when I became an RN!! [emoji35]).
Her monthly notes are obviously copy and paste, and she's always wondering how a Hospice patient can still qualify even after being on service six months.
Seriously? How about continued weight loss, (I honestly think the patient's weight isn't much more than skeleton and internal organs), complete decline of communication skills to sounds and random words, and progression to sleeping 22-23 hours/day?
Extra letters after your name don't mean you still aren't an idiot.
You're just different- which is an excellent thing. "Normal", if there is such a thing, is boring! (I speak as a 'different' person myself)
I learned a long time ago that as long as the people I care about love & accept me- everyone else can bugger off!
I lost my Father less than two weeks ago. I'm hoping the pain lessens as time goes by, but I expect to miss him every day for the rest of my life. (((((Hugs))))
I'm sorry to hear about your father, margin. My dad passed away almost 3 years ago on Good Friday. I'm not sure the pain of the loss actually lessens but you learn how to cope with it better as time goes on. The hardest thing for me was for several months after he died, I 'd see something on the news & think "I have to be sure to tell dad that". Then it would hit me that I can't do that any more. I'm still not able to drive past his house without crying because I know someone else is living in my dad's house. It's kind of a weird feeling.
You're just different- which is an excellent thing. "Normal", if there is such a thing, is boring! (I speak as a 'different' person myself)
I learned a long time ago that as long as the people I care about love & accept me- everyone else can bugger off!
I lost my Father less than two weeks ago. I'm hoping the pain lessens as time goes by, but I expect to miss him every day for the rest of my life. (((((Hugs))))
OrganizedChaos, LVN
1 Article; 6,883 Posts
I'm so sorry for your losses. [emoji17]
Everything seems to be working out. Compared to how this year started out, I'll take how it's currently going.