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:

Oh,my, paraldehyde!! use to give it in emena form for DT's. The first one I gave, I was an aide at my sm regional hospital at home (between my 1st and 2nd yr of nursing school) and no one told me about the" Special" non-plastic enema kits for these tx. Needless to say the first enema I mixed, did not make it to the room. What a mess and the Smell!!! Never made that mistake again.

Unit kitchens for making iced tea, coffee, custard and what was that other stuff.......Junket.

Dumb waiter that brought trays, supplies etc to the nurses station.

Etc............

Oh my! P_RN......you MUST be.........um, very "tired"!!!

Pans of iced water to keep the Cardiac Output monitor injectate cold.

Do you remember having to place JUST THE RIGHT amount of water on the transducer of the swan/art line to get the waveform to appear?

HEY WHERE IS THE SPIRITS OF PEPPERMINT? I CAN'T PEE:thankya:

Specializes in ORTHOPAEDICS-CERTIFIED SINCE 89.
Oh my! P_RN......you MUST be.........um, very "tired"!!!

Hey now, you're only a few behind me I see. Tee Hee

Specializes in ORTHOPAEDICS-CERTIFIED SINCE 89.

Oil of wintergreen glass bottle you wadded a 4x4 and stuffed it in the open mouth of the bottle. Kind of an improvised Air-wick to defeat foul odors. I can't stand even wintergreen life savers now.

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

Giving a Harris Flush!

Hey maybe I've just been working in caveman facilities, but I remember some of these things!

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:

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.)

Hey anybody remember Cantor tubes? Burn patients with AgNO3 dressings(the walls and floors were black so you couldn't see the stains). Cataract surgery patients with sandbags on both sides of their heads so they wouldn't turn!

sphigmomanometer.. if I remember correctly..

sphigmomanometer.. if I remember correctly..

The Manual BP monitoring machine... that is..

Sorry, did not specify earlier..oohhhhh.... sign-of-the times..

[bANANA][/bANANA]

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