Third Day...

no, not the band!

For the third day of clinicals, I wrote down specific goals I wanted to acheive during my shift and they included:

1. Give one patient his or her meds the entire day
2. Hang one IV bag
3. Assess all my patients after my nurse did so I could compare my findings

Soooooooo, my nurse let me give ALL the meds to ALL our patients, let me do 4 medications through INTs (one while she wasn't even in the room), help her hang a bag of blood for someone who needed some red blood cells, and let me draw up all the liquid medications we had to give that day. This nurse is a God-send and I have learned so much in just 3 days. I still, just from my experiences, am leaning towards being a med-surg nurse now over an ICU nurse (for now) and I feel at great peace about that decision. I always thought I wanted to be strictly ICU, but this experience so far made me realize that a generalized medical floor is extremely fun! I know I will be a cardiac expert one day, but I am trying really hard to keep my options open.

A little side note: 3 of our patients said I was going to be a great nurse one day and that I was doing a great job. My favorite patient from yesterday was this adorable 98 year old man who wanted so badly to get up and walk up and down the halls on his walker but PT never got around to bringing him a walker. While I was giving his medications via his IV, he made a wincing noise and scrunched his face up real tight. I immediately stopped and was apologizing all over the place for hurting him..... then he looked over at me and had a huge smile on his face!! He simply said, "I'm just kidding. You did a wonderful job taking care of me and it was my absolute pleasure to be your guinea pig"....... What a sweetheart! He really made my day even better :)