I have worked the night shift for the past five years now! It has sometimes been a struggle to figure out how to flip back and forth from days to nights. Do I stay up late the night before my shift and sleep in? Do I take a nap right before my shift? Check out these tips to find out the best sleeping pattern for you.
Who benefits from having hospice involved in their care? Hospice focuses on pain relief and comfort during the final phases of a patient's life. Is this a type of nursing you are interested in? In the ICU we do short-term hospice care for terminal patients. It takes a special type of nurse to help families through these difficult times.
Nurses are the backbone of patient care and play an essential role in the health of millions of individuals. This 30 minute video (I know, somewhat long, but worth it!) focuses on the impact that we have on patients and how amazing we are!
If my kids ever need surgery, these are definitely the doctors I would want! They are genuinely concerned about their pediatric patients and their experience surrounding surgery. Is this the scariest experience they'll ever have? How can we make this a little less nerve racking?
Suprapubic catheters are not a tube that I see very often in the hospital. How exactly do you care for one? Are they very different from a urethral catheter? Here is a simple summary on the indications and care of a suprapubic catheter.
There is such a variety of specialties within nursing. Is being a medical or surgical pediatric nurse the job for you? Some feel that it is too hard considering that they have kids the same ages as their patients. Others feel they can relate better to the patients because they have kids those ages. What do you think about this specialty?
Each type of nursing comes with different types of challenges. As an ICU nurse, we RARELY see patients discharged from the hospital. They are usually sent to a step down floor to a general floor and then home. We miss the last steps. What is rewarding about your nursing position? This video talks about the shows the perks of being an RN in a children's hospital ER. There is a great amount of satisfaction that comes from being a pediatric nurse.
This will be the best two minutes you take out of your day! Take a peek at these funny nursing e-cards. I don't know that most people would think they were funny, but we (as nurses) definitely have a "different" sense of humor. "So you admittedly smoke a pack a day and drink heavily, but haven't taken your $4 med for 3 months because you 'can't afford it.' Hmm."
I've often felt such heartache for pediatric patients undergoing chemotherapy, not only because of the obvious sadness that accompanies cancer, but also because they wouldn't be able to have children later in life. Is what I had thought true? How does chemotherapy actually affect fertility later in life?
Nursing can be a very stressful profession. We often deal with people in the worst situations they have ever experienced! We work holidays and weekends, and have all the politics of an ever-evolving healthcare system. We deal with emergency situations, death, and dying. Our guest post today is by Elizabeth Scala, an established author who strives to help nurses everywhere. So her question for all of us is, "Is All Stress Created Equal?"
