Sights and Sounds

A few things stick out in my mind of experiences I have had while in nursing school, working as an aid, and a nurse.  Here are some examples, there are many more, but these are what I think of first.

The gorgeous blue eyes that God gave to an elderly Down Syndrome patient.  The sound of her telling her nurse from the group home she lives in that she loves her.

The look of determination on a 17 years old face as she learned to walk again after a stroke.

A confused patient sitting nude in another patients room at 3 AM.

The tears of joy as a new mother hears her baby girl cry for the first time.

The look of sadness as an 80 year old man sits by his wife’s death bead.

A confused patient who has managed to raise his bed 6 feet off of the ground.

A loving mother rocking her baby who has just returned from surgery to repair her cleft lip.

The look of amazement and excitement when a patient hears his own voice after not speaking in months because of a stroke.

The look of anxiety when a man’s wife is rushed down the hall for an emergency C-Section.

Being hugged by a patient and his wife after I walked him out to their car.

The look of fear on a 29 year olds face after finding out he had a heart attack.

The look of wonder that I’m sure was on my face when I watched the birth of a 20 week old premature baby and saw him survive.

A Day in TCU

This is a run down of my day yesterday. Thankfully I only worked 8 hours and not 12. Up until this day I was feeling pretty confident about being on the floor alone and not so much after this day.

6:50 Show up at work, grab some breakfast from the cafeteria and head up to the unit to get my assignment.

7:30 Start to get report from night shift.

8:30 Hit the floor, yes it takes FOREVER to get report around this joint. Thankfully 3 of my patients were the same from the day before, so I knew what to expect from them. I have five patients today. I go into patient C’s room to assess her first because she has insulin due that is already 30 minutes late. I finish taking vital signs and start to listen to her lungs when one of the nurse practitioners walks in and asks if I can come back later. OK, whatever, I guess she’ll have to wait a while for that Tylenol for her head ache. I go onto the next patient and will come back to her ASAP. Phone rings “Can you talk to speech therapy about patient B?” Quick phone call from her. Phone rings again 2 minutes later with same girl telling me one of his tests have to be canceled because it will interfere with his Angio. OK, one less thing to deal with today.

9:00 Go to patient A’s room. She is also a new patient to me. Assess her, take vitals, start to answer questions about stress test. Transport shows up to take her to the first part of her stress test. Didn’t get meds passed first. ARGH!

9:20 Go to patient B’s room to help the nurse who is training me pull him up. Start to assess him and the aids walk in to bathe him. I do manage to finish with him before they start the bath, but meds still not passed in there. All while the patient is grumbling that he knows for sure that his wife is cheating on him.

9:40 Getting very frustrated that I can’t get anything done before being interrupted with other people needing one of my patients. Decide to go to patient E’s room. He is only 29 years old, he’s easy, asks for nothing, and only gets about 4 meds all day. Quickly assess him and cover his IV so he can hop in the shower. Of course he doesn’t have a Dr’s order saying he’s allowed to have the EKG monitor off so he can take one, so I stand right outside the door until he’s safely back in bed. Give him the two meds he gets in the morning and answer some questions. OH, and hook his monitor back up. Get a phone call from charge nurse that he’s having signs of ischemia, go back in and check on him. No chest pain, EKG starting to look better now that he laid back down. Poor kid.

10:10 Start to go into Patient D’s room but get a phone call from patient C’s wife. She has talked to him and hung up on him because he accused her of cheating. I want nothing to do with this. I just say that the night shift nurse passed on that he was confused last night about where he was, so he’s probably out of sorts. Discuss with her what time she needs to be at hospital in time for his test. Let her know that his consent still needs signed, she says she will be there in time to sign it. He’s been confused off and on and she is power of attorney, so I feel better with her signing it.

10:15 Go back to Patient C to give her meds. I’m almost done when tranport shows up to take her for MRI. I fill out transportation form, hurry up and give insulin shot, and sent her on her way.

10:30 Finally get into Patient D’s room. She is so sweet, but will talk your ear off if you don’t find a way out of the room. Assess her and start to get her meds ready when physical therapy shows up to walk her. Start to give her meds when she gets back from her short walk when she says she feels like her blood pressure dropped. Just great since I have 3 blood pressure meds to give her. Recheck blook pressure, it’s just fine. In fact it’s higher than it was originally. She refuses to take meds until I call the Dr. to make sure it’s OK. Make phone call and wait for him to call back. Lock meds back up.

10:45 Go get Patient B’s meds and out double check with preceptor what he’s allowed to have and not have before test. Give patient meds praying that he doesn’t choke on the huge horse pill that I couldn’t even swallow and I don’t have swallowing problems. He manages to get them all down. Thank goodness!

11:10 Patient A is back. Go get her meds and also double check what she can have before the second part of her test. Give her meds.

11:20 Patient D’s Dr shows up, talk to her about her blood pressure and meds. She says to give them, told ya lady! Go give patient her meds 2 1/2 hours late.

11:50 Start to draw up an IV push med for patient C that she gets 3o minutes after first meds. Glass vial is impossible to break top off of. It finally breaks and cuts me in the process. Blood runs all down hand and arm. Clean myself up and tape up my finger. Pick up second glass vial, drop it, it shatters all over the floor. Go back to patients medicine closet and pray that I have an extra vial so I don’t have to go down to pharmacy. My lucky day, I have one. Pull up med and give it.

12:30 Go to bathroom before I wet my pants.

12:35 Give Patient C her insulin again since her blood sugar hasn’t gone down at all.

12:40Transport is here for patient A. Of course the Stress Test staff didn’t call to tell me they were sending for her, so she hasn’t gotten the Adivan she was supposed to get 30 minutes before going down. Go get Adivan and tell transport it will be just a minute. Daughter of patient calls relative that is a pharmacist to tell him what I’m giving. Asks me a ton of questions that she relays on to the pharmacist. Wants to know why she is only getting 1mg, tell her that is all the Dr ordered. Patient starts to freak out about stress test. Finally convince her that the Adivan will have her feeling just fine in a few minutes. Patient and family are finally satisfied and they go on their way.

12:45 Patient B has had a PICC line ordered from the Dr. and he is going last minute to have it put in before going strait to the cath lab. Hurry to give him meds that he has to have before going to keep him from having a reaction to the Iodine he will have in the cath since he has an allergy to it. Hurry to have patient’s wife sign paper work. Answer their questions about the PICC and fill out paper work for transport. See him and family off.

After everyone was off for their tests the day quieted down somewhat. I didn’t sit down all day, but at least I got all of my meds passed finally. Almost all of them late, all day long, but they got them.

Phew, stresses me out just reliving the day.

Melissa…..RN!!!

So, I passed my boards.  It’s official, I’m a RN!!   Kind of scary.   I found out around lunch time at work the day after my test that I had passed.  I wasn’t planning on checking the website until I got home, that way if I failed I could melt into a puddle in private.  But, everyone at work was driving me crazy wanting me to check, so I did.  When I walked out of the corner where the computer was and told everyone I passed they all went crazy.  Hugs, screaming, and high fives.  It was awesome and I’m so glad I checked at work now.  Only fellow nurses can understand how that feels, so I’m glad I got to celebrate with my colleagues.  I’m going to have at least one more week of orientation before I am on my own.  We’ll see how this next week goes.  Thanks to everyone for your support through school and the stress of getting ready for boards!

My NCLEX Experience

So, I’m done.  The test is over.  Now the waiting begins.  I drove to Indianapolis yesterday around dinner time.  I swung by the testing center to make sure I could find it easily.  Then I headed to my aunts house where we watched Dancing with the Stars and I headed to bead.  I didn’t sleep well, one of those nights where you are in and out of sleep worried that you aren’t going to wake up in time.  So, since I didn’t really sleep I was up at 6:30.  I got ready, threw on some cumfy clothes and headed to the test.  I stopped and got some breakfast and snacks that I ended up not needing.  I got to the test center right on time and there were 4 or 5 of us on the elevator all heading to take our NCLEX.  Once we got to the Pearson testing center the lady at the desk was really nice.  We were all given directions, pretty much what isn’t allowed during the test.  Then we had to show our ID and ATT, sign our signature on an electronic pad, have our fingerprint taken twice, and get our picture taken.  High security for us law breaking nurses, ya know.  Then another lady called my name, checked my ID again and took my finger print again.  She went over the directions with me again, gave me a white board and marker, and walked me to my seat.  I then had to reread the directions again on the computer and click that I understood.  Then I had like a 5 question tutorial to make sure I knew how to take the test.  I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, said a quick prayer, and hit next for the real test to start.  Supposedly the first question is easy to get you off to a good start and help you start moving up in difficulty.  Yeah, I don’t remember what that first question was, but I had never heard of the disease.  Same with the next question, not good.  I wouldn’t say that any of the questions were easy, but I was pretty sure on quite a few of them.  I had several questions about rare diseases that I will probably never see.  I also had a lot of priority questions were all of the answers were patients who needed to be seen NOW and I had to choose who I would see first.  Then other questions were none the patients really had anything pressing going on I had to pick who to see first.  None, of the patients need anything right now?? Take a break while you can!!  Was what I wanted to answer.  Anyway, I got to 75 questions and the screen went blank for a second, just sitting there thinking, thinking, thinking……  At that point I was BEGGING the computer to shut off because I knew my brain was fading.  Thankfully, it finally popped up a screen telling my test was over and then had me complete a survey about 10 questions long about my test experience.  So, it’s over.  I feel pretty good about it, but who knows.  Hopefully the results are up sooner rather than later.

Preparing to take the NCLEX

The NCLEX is the test that all RNs must pass in order to be licensed by their state.  It is a computerized test that bases your next question on whether you got the previous question right or wrong.  If you got it correct the next question is harder, if you got it wrong it gets easier.  However, you must maintain an average level of difficulty in order to pass.  The test shuts off anywhere from 75 to 265 questions based on how long it takes the computer to decide if you passed or not.  No matter what state you are getting licensed in, you must take this test, but never have to take it again (THANK GOD!).  I have felt pretty prepared for this test.  Of course there are areas that I am scared of because I just do not have a lot of experience in that field, such as pediatrics and psych.  I feel that my school and job as an aid did an excellent job preparing me for this one life changing test.  I had to take a HESI test after each 9 week course of school and also had to pass the HESI in order to graduate from college.  The HESI is basicly a practice exam for the NCLEX to see if  you are ready to take boards.  I passed the HESI with flying colors, even though while taking the HESI I was sure I had failed miserably because it was so awful.  So, basicly for the past couple months while waiting to take the NCLEX I have answered at least 1,000 practice questions from my Saunders books and CDs.  At this point most of the questions seem easy, hopefully that is a good sign.  For the most part everyone tells me how hard the boards are, so I’m scared that these questions I have been practicing are still too easy.  Anyway, I’ll keep plugging away, studying the only way I know how.  I take the test Tuesday morning in Indianapolis.  Please pray for me during and after the test while I wait anxiously for the results.

Welcome to my new blog

I hope you enjoy my stories and insights along my travels as a new nurse. Learning, teaching, healing, caring, mistakes, heart break, love, frustration, and much more.