You Know You're an Old(er) Nurse If . . .

Nurses General Nursing

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You know you're an older nurse if:

1. You remember working with nurses who wore caps. :nurse:

2. You remember nurses (and doctors) sitting at the nurses station drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes while charting. :smokin:

3. You remember when charting was done (handwritten) in 3 different colors (black or blue for day shift, green for evening shifts, red for night shift).

4. You remember when IV fluids came only in glass bottles.

5. You remember when breast milk wasn't a biohazard. :redlight:

6. You remember when chest tube setups consisted of glass bottles, rubber stoppers, and tubing.

7. You remember when white polyester uniforms were the standard for nurses.

8. You remember when you'd have given your eye teeth for a comfortable pair of nursing shoes (we haven't always been able to wear athletic shoes).

9. You remember when the hospital's top nurse was the director of nursing and not the chief nursing officer.

10. You remember giving lots of IM shots for pre-ops and pain meds.

What else?

HollyVK (with patient care experience going back to 1972) :gandalf:

Must wear white Nylon stockings!

Specializes in ORTHOPAEDICS-CERTIFIED SINCE 89.

And a girdle not a garter belt to hold the nylons up. A garter belt would leave a tell-tale line.

Specializes in MedSurg-1yr, MotherBaby-6yrs NICU 4/07.
OLD OB RN:

remember when:

7. We were actually considered a hospital, not a hotel with "clients".

You mean it isn't the Beverly Grand when you have a baby? OMG - and to think I have busted my backside to help my GUESTS during their stay!!! LOL - yes we have to call them guests. Not patients, clients, customers, etc.... but guests. Puh - leeze. If you are in the hospital you are a patient, end of story.

I have used Maalox for tape burn. An older nurse taught me that when I worked at different facility. A lot of what we did sounds like a lot of the stuff on here. They still wear white, and many still wear their caps. They were allowed to stop in 1998. Also, apple juice, cranberry juice, and gingerale combined as a "bladder cocktail" to help a pt. void. I have used a Tubex countless times. Gave a milk and molasses enema just the other day to a post partum C/S with a very distended belly. A resident had heard of it, and I mentioned it, and next thing you know, we were calling dietary for molasses. Worked GREAT. Great thread - many things I knew or had heard, others were like WOW.

Specializes in OB, M/S, HH, Medical Imaging RN.
11. I remember working for 12 hours a day as special nurse.(This was the regular work hours per day for special nurses, at that time.)

What's a special 12hr nurse?

Specializes in OB, M/S, HH, Medical Imaging RN.

Wearing all white, having your period, no tampons, no self-adhesive pads, wearing a sanitary belt, monster sized pads!!

I thought I was an older nurse (59) until I read The Sinai Nurse (1852-2000). I couldn't believe what nursing was like in the 1800's. Leeches used to stop bleeds, third year diploma school nurses being the head nurse with a second year student being the asst. head nurse, being taught by doctors because there were hardly any graduate nurses, and young nurses losing their lives from flu epidemics. Most of your schooling was working in the hospital, and that was it. I now feel so much younger.

I thought I was an older nurse (59) until I read The Sinai Nurse (1852-2000). I couldn't believe what nursing was like in the 1800's. Leeches used to stop bleeds, third year diploma school nurses being the head nurse with a second year student being the asst. head nurse, being taught by doctors because there were hardly any graduate nurses, and young nurses losing their lives from flu epidemics. Most of your schooling was working in the hospital, and that was it. I now feel so much younger.

Is this book sold anywhere else online? I found it on a website. Is this it??

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That's the website I got it from. They also send another hard covered book for free called The Forty Seven Hundred. It is about the first 4700 nurses graduating from the Mount Sinai School of Nursing oprning in 1852. I had already read that book getting it from Amazon.com. I would try Amazon.com for The Sinai Nurse. You may be able to get it used. Krisssy

Specializes in Babies, peds, pain management.

I worked in OB and we used to save the "clean" placentas, freeze them and sell them to a cosmetic company. The mec ones either went to path or down the placenta grinder.

After reading all of these, I think its safe to say that we're not getting older but improving with age.:lol2:

Specializes in cardiac med-surg.

you get out of bed for a day shift and your body already hurts !

I remember the RN spilling mercury on the desk and these little beads of it rolling around everywhere. We had to gather up the mercury and then it all stayed together and she pushed it back into the bottle. I think she was putting the mercury in a dobhoff tube for weight. I was watching her do this and I think the mercury got on her wedding band and ate the gold off of her ring.. Does this sound correct? This was alot of years ago. I was an LPN so was just watching her.

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