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A nursing friend and I recently discussed what we still learned in nursing school that later proofed to be utter nonsense outright or just became really outdated. I found it quite interesting and was wondering what everyone else remembers?
One of the things I thought of was the myth of your tongue having different taste zones.
Sterile dressing changes... it's not bad to know sterile technique but it's sure not done anymore in the vast majority of cases.
ArtClassRN, don't worry, after a short amount of time you'll discover you also were taught things that are no longer found to be true, no matter how good your program was. It's the nature of working in healthcare. In the majority of these situations, our teachers were doing the best they could with the information available.
It's hard to let go of practices because it means admitting that at one time, without knowing it, we were doing more harm than good--even if that harm was just wasting time and money (like with sterile dressing changes).
Reality orientation for very demented patients does not work. If the 89-year-old lady thinks it is 1988, and her long-deceased husband is still alive, and Ronald Reagan is the president, it is better to allow her to think these things.Telling her it is 2016, and her husband's been dead since 1995, and Ronald Reagan's been dead since 2004 is unlikely to be therapeutic or go very well.
I think this is top of the list! I was always uncomfortable with this particular aspect. My previous experience was with children. Now that I work with a large population of older adults with dementia, I know that this is NOT a good practice in reality. The amount of confusion that results from attempts to re-orient to a reality that the patient might not care for is just cruel.
I must strongly disagree. The goal of reality orientation is not to convince a patient with dementia of what the reality is. That would be cruel. The goal of a reality orientation group is to have fun. To engage a small group of patients, psych or dementia, and explore their reality. On ocassion, albeit rarely, something is shared that puts a real smile on their face. It has been my experience that no matter how "out there" someone may be, deep in the windmill of their mind, there exist a real moment. Sould that moment return, for just a second, reality orientation took place. The coffee and cookies are a plus s well. Joe a. retired psych nurse.
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