What makes a COB crusty?

[Pepper The Cat]

Here are

some reasons why us Crusty Old Bats are Crusty! COB jump in

1. Back in the "old days" we were respected. If we said " visiting hour are over, you need to leave." Families left. Now, they stay anyway.

2. Back in the old days, the families said "doctors/nurses know best. Now it's "well I saw on Dr Oz /Oprah/whatever that this should be done. And if Dr Oz/Oprah says it is so, it must be.

Or

3. I read in the Internets that the doctor should go into the parking lot, find a red Mazda, walk around it three time counter-clockwise while saying "stroke go away" and Mom will be cured. Did the Doctor do this? Why not? Will they?

4. Back in the old days, student were not asked if they "wanted to do a cath". We were told, Mr Brown needs a cath, you will do it.

5. Back in the old days we didn't have special apps to figure out everything for us. We had to learn it, remember it and keep it in our brain.

6. Back in the old days we wrote a 2 days exam for our license and then waited 2 months for results. There was no PVT, no 75 questions, etc.

My fellow COB, what makes you crusty?

[MECO28, BSN, RN]

The giving up the chair thing would make me mad. I learned how to calculate drip rates in nursing school but haven't had to do it since....

[Guttercat, ASN, RN]

I am not "old" but have been a nurse a long time. I think I would call myself a COB at this point.

I realized I was a COB when I asked a student nurse to run get us all lattes at lunch. And she did. I felt bad, kind of, OK not really. We all had a good laugh about it.

Looking back to when I was a student and a new nurse, I much preferred the "old bats" to the nurses with 3-10 years under their belts. The seasoned nurses (usually) had long since gotten past b*t**iness and chest thumping.

[tokmom, BSN, RN]

Having potassium, heparin and insulin vials sitting on top of the med cart because management trusted us to use our brain.

I remember mixing my own potassium to make an IV bag, and adding insulin to the TPN.

1) I rarely panic.

2) All bleeding eventually stops.

3) See #1

[ThePrincessBride, MSN, RN, NP]

Aw man...how on Earth did you guys survive???? Major props!

I am not a "COB" (a little batty, at times ) but I have talked to many seasoned nurses. Many remember times when it was not unusual to have 10+ patients on a med/surgical unit, when women with healthy pregnancies stayed in the hospital for over a week and the babies did not have little tracking devices attached to their ankles, when people wiped butts and touched body fluids WITHOUT gloves and worked eight-hour shifts, five days a week. And of course, being expected to give up chairs for MDs, though I still see that practice occasionally.

[BSNbeauty, BSN, RN]

I'm not a COB, but boy am I enjoying reading these. Keep em coming.

[whichone'spink, BSN, RN]

I would only give up a chair if all other computer stations are taken and the doctor has to put in orders. Too bad EPIC does not have an app for a tablet.

[SeattleJess]

COBs rock. As a squishy new nursing student, I wish I could just pick up a crust at the bookstore along with the scrubs and the clip pens.

Pass the breadcrumbs, I want me some crust NOW!

:bowingpur:

[MECO28, BSN, RN]

I'm curious...to the COB out there; when you had 10+ patients were you able to do hourly rounding? Because I can't imagine; my max is 5 patients and that can be hard at times.

[Mr. Murse]

what's funny to me is thinking about everything we "younger" nurses do now, and how we'll be talking about it in the future the way you guys are talking about the "old days". I wonder what things we do now on a regular basis that we'll look back on in 15 years and marvel at how archaic it was.

[RNsRWe, ASN, RN]

what's funny to me is thinking about everything we "younger" nurses do now, and how we'll be talking about it in the future the way you guys are talking about the "old days". I wonder what things we do now on a regular basis that we'll look back on in 15 years and marvel at how archaic it was.

Think text messages :) Future generations will look back on our little cell phones with the same giggles as the 20-somethings do now when they see pictures of the FIRST cell phones, LOL. I had a "portable, cordless cell" that was also called a "bag phone"; it was the size of a shoebox and came in its own briefcase! Yes, shoulderstrap and all, I had me a cell phone back then

[RNsRWe, ASN, RN]

Well.....I don't have the same nursing years under my belt, but I factor in previous career and I'm pretty DANGED crusy, LOL.

So what makes the crusty stuff grow on me? Hearing "I don't have to do that, I've already been checked off on that skill" from a student. EXCUSE ME?? You're assigned to a nurse who is giving you the opportunity to do something you NEED to learn how to do, and your answer is "I don't HAVE to"? Crust...forming....creeping....top layer....

[Guttercat, ASN, RN]

I'm curious...to the COB out there; when you had 10+ patients were you able to do hourly rounding? Because I can't imagine; my max is 5 patients and that can be hard at times.

I never worked a tele/stepdown or MS floor where we had ten patients. (Well, there was that one place...nobody stayed there for long.) But anyway, 6-8 was the norm.

Realize that up until ten years and more ago, patients were not on so much of a "revolving door" schedule. There was little "hit the floor, take report on five patients, discharge three of them by noon and pick up two or three admits/transfers by 4PM."

The other main difference is that the delivery of care was much more streamlined 10 or 15 years ago. The very same task that used to take three minutes to complete and document, now takes six to ten.

There were also no "pocket phones" ringing and beeping every minute.

It's not that science, knowledge, and expertise has increased all that much, it's that there are many more barriers to the actual delivery of care.