What is Med/Surg?

[WldChrry]

Ok, I probably sound really silly right now, but what is med/surg? I am not a nurse (obviously) but I am trying to get into school for my RN. My cousin is a nurse, and she told me that she thinks that doing at least a year of med/surg when you're a new nurse is good for your career/learning. Also, I see alot of posts on here about med/surg. Help me out:confused:

[JomoNurse]

it's an area of the hospital for the healthiest, sickest people (if that makes sense). ICU is for the really sick, telemetry is for people that aren't THAT sick, but need to be monitored closely, and med/surg is you're sick, but you don't have to be THAT closely monitored. in other words, you're a pretty stable hospital patient. you get all kinds of patients, from pneumonia, broken bones, strokes, post-op patients, alcohol withdrawal (oh god these, patients make me want to quit on the spot). A lot of the patients are discharged directly home. Because the patients are stable, you get more patients per nurse.

[Kora0880, BSN, RN]

Medical and Surgical nursing......this is a good place to get started, as you will be learning a lot about a lot, very diverse population and therefore a lot of skills learned here :) Typically adult floor with both chronic and acute conditions, a lot of geriatrics, some cardiac pts on monitors may be seen, internal medicine pts, pre and post surgical pts., pt with infectious diseases (TB for ex.) you will see a lot of isolation for C-diff, MRSA, VRE and the like, some pt's with immunocompromised conditions, some psych pts with overdose episodes...I could go on and on.......basicaly anything that does not end up in ICU and comes from the street or another facility (including nursing homes). Also depending on the agency you work for, some hospitals may have specialty areas such as urology, simple GYN rolled in to it......very very diverse :)

I cannot agree with the above post, stating that Med Surg pt do not need to be closely minotored or that hey are not as sick....I rather dissagree b/c unlike ICU you do not have the luxury of having all the monitors and oftentimes ICU pts come with a certain definitive diagnosis. On Med Surg floor, people are admitted often for rule out conditions, meaning basically we have not idea what it is at this time....so there is a definite potential for very very sick pts to be taken care by you on the Med/Surg floor. As a matter of fact you will see TOW and AOW to and from ICU/OR on Med/Surg. Close monitoring is required for pts requring transfusions, some non blood related infusions, and definately when pts come from OR/PACU. So assessment skills are a very important and you will learn those quick.

Best of luck,

K

[WldChrry]

I see...so it's a little more challenging, because even though the patients aren't too sick, you are responsible for more patients when you work in this unit.

[Tait, MSN, RN]

It is so odd to me why so many people separate "telemetry" into something on it's own.

Our telemetry patients are a whole variety of patients from walkie-talkies waiting for heart caths to bed rest patients with pulmonary emboli to complex GI patients in Afib RVR on multiple cardiac drips.

Tait

To the OP: It depends on where you work. When I worked a small rural hospital the majority of our patients were fairly straight forward, if they got to complicated they were transferred. Where I work now, in a metropolitan hospital, we are almost near step down ICU status. Drains, complex fresh post-ops, plus everything else under the sun. ICU nurses fear coming to the floor because we carry heavy patients and have to take care of six of them at once. They are in no way shape or form easier.

Med/Surg can be one of the most challenging places to work, fastest burn out, highest expectations, lowest support staff ratios. But if you can work med/surg you can move on to anywhere. It hones skills, refines time management and strengthens overall medical knowledge.

[Anisettes, BSN, RN]

Refers to Medical/Surgical wards. For patients either prior to surgery, post surgery, for general medical hospitalizations for exacerbations/complications of whatever medical problems they have such as diabetes, COPD, etc... An all around catch-all for patients who are sick but don't require specialized units like ICU.

I agree that everyone should do at least one year of Med/Surg - you will work like a dog, BUT you will be more well rounded, you will learn organization and time management skills that will serve you well in whatever specialty you may move on to later and it will make you appreciate that nurse on the other end of the phone when you call from the ED with a new patient or the ICU with a downgraded patient or where ever else you may find yourself with yet another admission, because you'll know what s/he's feeling (and already trying to juggle) because you've been there and done that.

Good luck to you!

[JomoNurse]

Yes, that's the downer. Because they aren't that sick, you get more of them. We don't really do anything complicated in Med/Surg. We get nurses that "float" from the ICU to Med/Surg. (by the way, a float nurse is when they bring a nurse to a different part of the hospital because there is a need for a nurse because they are short staffed). I've seen ICU nurses go insane trying to take care of more than 1 - 2 patients. On the OTHER hand, Med/Surg nurses aren't floated to ICU because we wouldn't have a clue what to do!

Go the area of nursing that interests you. Med/Surg is completely different from the ICU and, to me, at least, makes no sense to work in Med/Surg to "gain skills". That always make me chuckle.... the skills you use in the ICU are quite different than Med/Surg.

[oramar]

it's an area of the hospital for the healthiest, sickest people (if that makes sense). ICU is for the really sick, telemetry is for people that aren't THAT sick, but need to be monitored closely, and med/surg is you're sick, but you don't have to be THAT closely monitored. in other words, you're a pretty stable hospital patient. you get all kinds of patients, from pneumonia, broken bones, strokes, post-op patients, alcohol withdrawal (oh god these, patients make me want to quit on the spot). A lot of the patients are discharged directly home. Because the patients are stable, you get more patients per nurse.

That is the standard definition of med/surg, it is what management believes when they staff. The truth is that sometimes stable people sit in ICU for a few days and that telemetry and med/surg have large numbers of very sick people who ought to be in ICU all the time. It is not unusual to have 8 patients on med/surg and have between 1 and 3 of them need constant monitoring. The truth is it is a crap shoot as far as the condition of your patients on med/surg.