Protected: Last Day of Clinicals Fall Semester

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Filed under: Life, Nursing school, Uncategorized , clinicals, Nursing, Nursing school, nursing student, surgery, total hip replacement

Protected: Heroes in Clinicals.

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Filed under: Life, Nursing school, Uncategorized , AKAs, clinicals, dealing with diabetes, diabetes, hospitals, Nursing, Nursing school, PVD, sickness

Protected: Clinical Update

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Filed under: Life, Nursing school , administering shots, ampules, bed baths, clinicals, filtration needles, hospitals, IM, Nurses, Nursing school, shots, SubQ, total care

Love What You Do and Do What You Love

I’ve been thinking a lot about the future and specifically my future career as a nurse.

I wonder if I’ve made the right choice or if I will look back, jaded, and shake my head at young idealistic me. What do I hope for this career? What do I hope to be as a nurse?

We had a “Professionalism Forum” on Friday which was really more about patients and caring then professionalism, or at least that’s the way it seemed to me. Then again, maybe caring is really what professionalism is about.

A man got up and spoke about his daughter’s stay in the hospital and eventual death from cancer. As he talked about what the hospital workers meant to his daughter his voice was cracking and he was on the verge of tears and it reminded me, once again, why I wanted to be a nurse in the first place.

Another thing that made me think about my future and how I want to work was a lecture I heard at a campus fellowship meeting. It was by a christian physician in the area and

she asked us if we wanted to bring our christianity into our practice as healthcare professionals.

She mentioned that she has heard of many doctors who are christians but not necessarily good doctors and she has heard of many doctors who are not christians but are excellent professionals.

I also caught the tail end of a sermon by Chip Ingram on the radio and he was talking about work and how you don’t want to waste that part of your life. Think about how much time of your day you spend working-that’s not a time you want to wish away.

So the question is how do you reclaim that time? How do you work so that you can GLORIFY GOD and ENJOY IT?

In Ecclesiastes Solomon says, “Moreover, when God gives any man wealth and possessions and enables him to enjoy them,

to accept his lot and BE HAPPY IN HIS WORK–this is a gift of God.”

In Ephesians and Colossians Paul tells slaves

“Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men.”

Chip Ingram also mentioned in his sermon that we would work in heaven. That’s right, there will be WORK in HEAVEN because you know what,

WE WERE CREATED TO ENJOY WORK and I bet if you think about it you will realize that you do. I know I do.

I pray that God will grant me the gift of enjoying being a nurse and continue to remind me that the reason I got into nursing was not necessarily to be the PERFECT nurse but to love and serve the patients.

Filed under: Life, Moral/Spiritual, Nursing school, Uncategorized , Caring, Chip Ingram, Colossians, Ecclesiastes, enjoying work, Ephesians, heaven, Nurses, Nursing, Professionalism, work

Clinics and Blood and VAMPIRES…(jk about the vampires)

Today I had hospital orientations because I am starting clinicals NEXT WEEK. I am going to be working on the med-surg floor of a privately run hospital in Augusta. There are 8 other girls working at that hospital with me and we all showed up looking like smurfs in our bright blue and white scrubs, fresh faced and eager at 8:00 am (or 0800 in hospital speak).

We didn’t really do much today except look at the computer system and learn a little bit about the hospital protocol.  It didn’t matter though, my heart was still going like a race horse half the time. I don’t know why, but just the thought of dealing with a real live patient still freaks me out. It doesn’t matter that we will only be doing the most elementary stuff like bathing them and taking vitals, I just get really nervous.

Oh and yesterday we took blood.  The official name for it is Venipuncture, in case you ever wanted to know. I practiced once on the plastic hand they had lying on the table and then just decided to go for it. So I tentatively tied the turnaquette (or however you spell that)…swabbed the site…sung happy birthday (to let the alcohol dry, you know)…and stabbed…

AND

no blood. shucks.

I tried again later, same girl, same arm still no blood. Finally I tried on another girl whose vein was just jumping out at me…and I got blood. pshew, I was beginning to question my career choice!

Also learned how to start an IV. Boy, there’s a lot to remember there. Our instructor warned that it would take about five times of actually doing it before we could ACTUALLy do it correctly.

That’s all for now.

Filed under: Life, Nursing school, Uncategorized , clinicals, drawing blood, hospitals, Nursing, nursing students, venipuncture