My New Home

Please come visit me at my new home :

MyStrongMedicine

I no longer blog on this web page.

Thanks for visiting.

Carpe Diem

Med-Bloggers Web 2.0

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Please remember to add my new blog home to your RSS feed. I am mirror posting here for a while in hopes to get all my readers to follow me to my new home.

My new home: MyStrongMedicine . I will soon no longer be blogging here.

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Let the Games Begin

A new blog post

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My new home: MyStrongMedicine . I will soon no longer be blogging here.

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My Mom the Stubborn Brick Wall

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My new home: MyStrongMedicine . I will soon no longer be blogging here.

 

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I DO want to go home.. but I don’t want to have to work for it.

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Please remember to add my new blog home to your RSS feed. I am mirror posting here for a while in hopes to get all my readers to follow me to my new home. I will soon no longer be blogging here.

My new home: MyStrongMedicine

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So the patient states he hates the hospital. They want to go home.

Of course they do!!! No one voluntarily comes to the ICU as a patient (at least the last time I checked).

So you take the time to explain to the patient, here is what you need to do. If you do more of this, this, and this it will be one step closer to you being discharged from the ICU and potentially discharged out of the hospital. (Now it of course is not that simple of a journey, but every small piece of effort does get them one step closer to home.)

They listen, the agree, you implore them to work hard. They nod and say of course.. ‘I want to get better’.

Then an hour later their complaining about what they have to do.

‘Do I have to do that.’

‘Can’t I lay back in bed?’

‘But it hurts to do that’

‘Can’t I just take my pills’

Case in point. Trauma pt is on his last leg of recovery. A passenger in an MVA. Rib fractures, VAP, bilateral pneumothorax’s, blah blah blah.. and trached.

He’s now off the ventilator, at the Trach Mask stage. No chest tubes. Minimal secretions from his trach. Not needing any suction. So we get him out of bed, into the bedside chair.

Go through the list of ‘things you need to do’. Which includes being in the chair! Being in the chair instead of laying in bed actually does have some medical benefits!

He nods appropriately. Yes I’ll stay in the chair! I want to be in the chair. I want to go home, etc, etc.

1 hr later…

Call light goes off…

‘Can I get back in bed now?’

And of course I ask why? Are you feeling short of breath? Having trouble breathing? Are you having chest pain? Are you feeling nauseated? What seems to be the problem

‘No. I just want to lay down. I want to sleep.’ (It’s 1pm)

 

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And the beat goes on…

Carpe Diem

 

Technorati Tags: nurse,recovery

A Nurse

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My new home: MyStrongMedicine

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I am a nurse. For those of you that know me I don’t hide this. In fact I am very proud of my profession and my choice to become a Registered Nurse. I must confess before I pursued my nursing career my ideas of what a nurse is, what a nurse does, and what a nurse represents were very misguided and … well frankly just plain wrong!

I was like the rest of society. My impressions and opinions were formed from what I had seen and heard from the media, from what little knowledge I gained through my own schooling, as well as my own personal experiences.

"A nurse passes pills and cleans up poop right?"

"A nurse is the doctors subordinate right?"

"A nurse wears that funny white outfit and hat right?"

"Women are nurses and men are doctors right?"

Yep, I’ve heard most of ’em. The sad thing is I hear this more than I ever hear anything that resembles the truth. What a nurse is, does and represents?

Here’s an even more upsetting fact. I did a Google search for the term ‘nurse’. Take a look at the first image that was listed:

 

That tells you what the public’s image is of a nurse. The stereotypical ‘naughty nurse’.. oversized breasts and an undersized mind and personality. I sit here shaking my head at what kind of battle we nurses face every day when it comes to not simply doing our job, but to have to defend our career and our profession on a daily basis from definitions like the one I just listed.

It’s either the ‘naughty nurse’ or the white-capped subordinate that most people will think of instead of the independent, critical-thinking, aggressive, compassionate healthcare professional that I work with and work as every day. (Check out some other thoughts on this subject at Head Nurse or About A Nurse)

Oh… and I didn’t even touch on the ‘male-nurse’ subject.

 

Technorati Tags: nurse

Get your CAT scanned..

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OK OK. I just had to share this one. A new ‘kind’ of CAT (CT) scan:

Now that there’s funny, I don’t care who ya are. That there’s funny.

Image source: I Can Has Cheezburger

 

Technorati Tags: CAT scan,ct scan,joke

Get Rid of the Patient

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OK. OK. It sounds worse than it really is. It was a joke made by a colleague in reference to the ‘common’ theme amongst different healthcare settings.

Think about it.

What do the pre-hospital staff want to do? The EMT and Paramedics are there to stabilize the patient, transport the patient to the appropriate facility (usually a hospital) and ‘Get Rid if the Patient’.

What if the patient is an in-patient. It doesn’t matter what acuity setting, Med-Surg, Telemetry, ICU. The staff is there to help mend wounds and facilitate recovery of the patient to either transfer them to an extended care facility (nursing home and/or rehabilitation unit) or possibly home and ‘Get Rid of the Patient’.

So now the patient is at the Rehab/Extended care unit. The staff there is responsible for ensuring the course of treatment assists in returning the patient to there pre-incident status and function. They progress the patient to function as independently as possible to discharge them home and …. ‘Get Rid of the Patient’!

LMAO.

Aww. C’mon. It was a lil’ funny, wasn’t it?

Carpe Diem

Technorati Tags: nurse,get rid of the patient,joke

New Orleans Orders Mandatory Evacuation

 New Orleans orders mandatory evacuation – Yahoo! News

I hope and pray that all who are involved stay safe and take all the necessary and suggested precautions.

I have a close friend whose family suffered severe loss during Katrina, so please take heed.

Take care of yourselves and yours.

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Please remember to add my new blog home to your RSS feed. I am mirror posting here for a while in hopes to get all my readers to follow me to my new home.

My new home: MyStrongMedicine

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Technorati Tags: gustav,evacuation,new orleans

Reality Check

Nothing changes until something moves.

(Or someone)

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Please remember to add my new blog home to your RSS feed. I am mirror posting here for a while in hopes to get all my readers to follow me to my new home.

My new home: MyStrongMedicine 

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Carpe Diem

Technorati Tags: reality check,change