Good sign?

I applied for the full time position in my department. I got the email today confirming that I would be considered a candidate for the position by the HR person.

And today, my boss spent the entire day asking me questions about things on the floor. She acted (debatable, as she is as bright as a black crayon) like she didn't know what was going on, and had me fixing everything. I'm looking at it as a sign that maybe she wants to see if I'm up to the challenge.

I also got a compliment for dealing with a very trying co-worker. Home-slice has been an RN for 4 days now, and she thinks she can get by with bossing me and the new aide around. It doesn't happen like that. First off, I worked as an aide for too long, and I understand the shitty work they do, and the piss poor wages they get paid for doing it. Nobody will talk bad to my aides and get by with it on my watch. Especially when I know this girl works hard, and does everything she can to help out. So home-slice then decided to boss me around, and played the "I'm old enough to be your mother" card. Still didn't work. I told her that to get respect she needed to give it, and my mother would never treat me like that.

3:30 comes around, and home-slice decides to announce loudly how it is finally time she gets to head home, since she has been there since 6:15 this morning. (Others got there before her and were still there, but she isn't approved for overtime) I finally got tired of listening to her bitch, so I asked why she stayed so late if she wasn't suppose to. "My patient just now left. I couldn't leave when I still had a patient on the floor"!!!!!!! I think this was because I had to leave a patient that was ready for discharge at lunchtime, because the cafeteria was only open for another 3 minutes, but anyways... Everyone else on the floor had tears running down their faces when I asked if she planned on moving in to the hospital when she went back to the floor and her patients stayed in the hospital for weeks sometimes and didn't go home. Her face went completely blank, and she stuttered and went running out the door.

Home-slice needs to work on her sarcasm, and her stupidity.

And boss lady needs to hurry up and tell me that I got the full time position that I want.

Suzy Sunshine and Debby Downer

Some people are serious scumbag jerks who do not deserve to live. Unfortunately, it is true that the good die young, and said scum lives forever.

Today was a trying day. We were short on staff to begin with, and was hit all at once with an automobile accident- 2 people needed emergency surgery for broken bones and the ER sent us a patient with a ruptured appendix at the same time.

Things got a little backed up. Every bed was full in the outpatient department. We sent 2 people back to the floor to get transfusions. We called several people and rescheduled their operations.

During all of this, most people were understanding of the wait for their procedures. One patient that I got the chance to spend the day with was a young person who was having a risky but necessary procedure. Because of his current health problems, the chances of him making it through the surgery and recovering was going to be slim. However no matter how many times I walked back to tell him and his family their approximate wait time, and to apologize for how long he had been in the stretcher, he always had a smile on his face and said that he didn't mind. His family was equally as nice.

Next door was the complete opposite. This patient was rude and uncooperative from the moment she walked through the doors. They complained about everything, and when I walked back to explain the wait time would be longer due to the emergencies, they all became completely belligerent, saying that their time was important and they deserved better treatment. Nothing that anyone did was enough to please this lady. The lights were too bright, the room was too cold, the hot blanket was too hot. And because her husband was related to the old hospital CEO, she demanded that she get the best of everything. Umm, yeah... Right. Nobody cares who your husband is.

For 3 hours I dealt with these 2 patients, who were complete night and day opposites. It made me so furious that someone who knew they were possibly about to die could be so happy, while the other (who was only there for an I&D) demanded that the world revolve around them.

I left before sunshine was out of surgery. Hopefully I will be able to hear a good report tomorrow.

I have worked in healthcare for several years now, and I have dealt with these kinds of things before, but no matter what it always breaks my heart when things like this happen. I can feel it eat away at my soul. I need a drink and vacation I guess. These 2 jobs are wearing me down quickly.

In other news, both the hospital and nursing home have offered me full time positions. Now I just have to decide which is more worth it. I get more money at the hospital, and I can get my meds for cheap through the pharmacy there, but long term care is what I really want to do. Decisions, decisions...

Weekly wrap up

I apologize for my non-posting ways. We got hit pretty bad with a storm that knocked out electric, and my Internet isn't working properly, so as a last resort, I'm typing this on my phone. So please excuse any spelling errors or anything that might occur.

My first week as an RN has come and gone. It wasn't really eventful. I have never worked in surgery before, so I was mostly learning the ins-and-outs of the floor, and answering call lights since thats about all I knew to do. Honestly, it's not a bad job. I had my first 4th of July off in years, and I actually got to watch the fireworks without being in a patients room. I also have every weekend off.

There is just one potential problem, and that is one of the nurses that I work with. She's a flat-out bitch. I was sent to PACU to work with her to put vitals in the computer. The problem was, I had very little knowledge of the computer, and how they wanted them entered. Bitchy nurse said she didn't I've time to tell me about it, and didn't want to help me. So after we had a little argument (luckily the patient was still knocked out) he decided to be a little nicer and help me out some.

The only other problem this week was a patient that I knew outside the hospital. This man knew that I haven't been a nurse for long, and dint want me to start his IV. While I was prepping and getting everything started for him, he began to yell that he didn't want me to make him a pin cushion. By the time someone came back to see what he was yelling about, I was already finished with it. Probably beginners luck, but the man changed his tune a bit when I offered to take it out so someone else could stick him. He also complimented me at the end of the day for how well I took care of him.

 

The problem with a small hospital? You don't get many options

I'm still pretty sad that I'm not back on the floor with all my old friends. But I still walk back for visits occasionally. Rumor is, there's gonna be an opening soon, and it will be full time night shift. I'm pretty excited, and a little hopeful, although this no nights, weekends, and holidays is pretty cool. I guess im just gonna have to wait.

I'm sure there's more I could go on about that happened this week, but I honestly can't think right now. Next week I get to spend 2 days at orientation for Job #2, if they decide to call me.

More storms are headed my way. Hopefully the electric stays on so I don't have to wait another week to post.

Fired already?

I got called into HR office the other afternoon, along with the CEO and a Social Worker.

A friend of mine posted on Facebook about Shitty Hospital. I happened to comment on her post, because I was curious to know more about the reason behind her negativity. Not that there is a good thing to say about where I work...
Anyways, because I had commented "What happened?" that automatically meant that I had so many bad things to say. When I really just wanted to know what happened. After  I started to get notifications out the ass, I deleted my comment, because I wasn't any closer to finding out my answer than I was before I commented. I had just hoped that the bad things weren't about me or my department.

One of my coworkers who has had it out for me since I was an aide turned in my comments, along with saying that I was in on the negativity.

After a 45 minute conversation about how I didn't post anything negative, and I deleted my comment anyways, I was finally told that I could return to the floor, and that someone would call my supervisor and tell them that I would not be fired after all. Really? People are now getting fired for asking questions, with the hopes that if it is about them, they want to try and set things straight? They told us in orientation that if something negative was said about the hospital that we should find out as much information as possible, and then try to straighten it out, or turn in the info to the supervisor so that the complaint can be known. I think that might have been my saving grace, because I after looking the SW in the eyes and quoting her orientation speech, the tables turned to my favor.

Even if I did have something negative to say, when I am off the clock, and I am expressing my own opinion which I am entitled to, should it be right to come back to haunt me later? My Facebook is not associated at all with the hospital, (only the nursing home, because it is nice, and nobody there gives a fuck what we post/say) so unless people know me very closely and know the 2 places I work at, it shouldn't matter.

Maybe this means that I will be blogging more, so nobody knows me.

Tomorrow is Monday. And it is the start of 2 very awesome weeks. I'm going to be very busy, so you can probably expect to see some more from me. 

The Nursing Home is pissing me off

Last week I had my general orientation. I got a call last evening to come back today and start my new nurse orientation and training. That was all the message said.

I showed up this morning, wearing my scrubs at 7 and clocked in. I had no idea what time I was to actually show up, where to go, or what to do, so I hung out around the front of the building for a bit and then went to the staff coordinators office.

She wasn't there yet, nobody knew what I was there for, or what I needed to do. They just hired a new coordinator, and I'm the first person to go through this "nurse training". Yippee.

My day consisted of watching more videos on Resident's rights and talking to the same people I talked to last week. We also went over the same kind of paperwork as last week. It was a serious waste of time, and going through it once was bad enough.

I'm suppose to go back for 2 more days of this bullshit. Maybe.

I applied for a full time position at the hospital. It's working in the outpatient surgery department where I currently am. After I applied for it I found out that my name is on the schedule to work on the same floor as my friends, and it is more long term care, so I'm not sure what to do with myself.

I will never understand...

We had a lady today that came in to get a knee replacement. She was so large that she had to be wheeled around to the back of the hospital and weighed on our laundry scales, because none of the other scales in the hospital went up past 350.

She was mad, because this is her 3rd knee replacement. She spent the entire morning complaining while I assessed her that the surgeon didn't know what he was doing, or else she wouldn't be going through this trouble and pain. She complained about being NPO since midnight because she couldn't go to McDonalds. She complained about being too cold, then the warm blanket made her too hot. And don't get me started on how she screamed like a 2 year old when we tried to start her IV.

On top of obesity, she had every problem known to man. Diabetes? Check. COPD? Check. Neuropathy? Check. The list went on and on...

It was a pretty busy day at the hospital, so after recovering in PACU, we had to move her back to the outpatient area until a bed came open on the floor. I brought her husband back to see her.

They pulled the curtain for privacy. And I started to smell something. Something fried, greasy, and nauseating. After getting another nurse, we peered around the curtain, and watched in awe as the patient ate 6 cheeseburgers. Yes, there was 6 we counted the wrappers in the trashcan. While we were trying to find the charge nurse, someone had put an order through to the kitchen to send her a tray.

I walked back to her cubicle with charge nurse and her doctor to find the aide setting down, feeding the patient. The doctor demanded that the aide stop, and the patient burst into tears, screaming that she would die if she didn't eat soon.

The doctor (and I love him) stated she that she didn't get to be that size by not feeding herself, and that it would be a cold day in hell when she finally starved.

The patient signed herself out AMA and shrieked that she was going somewhere where the staff actually cared about the patients and allowed the hungry ones to eat. Then she proceeded to shit on the floor.

After that episode, we all stood waving good riddance at the door.

Funny how a melody sounds like a memory...

I had my gallbladder taken out some time ago. I suffered for about 9-10 months before I was able to get it out.

Today I had the joy of recovering a lap chole (gallbladder surgery for anyone confused). It started off fine. The patient came back, and everything was going great. I was actually able to use my previous experience to answer all the questions asked, based on my experience.

Fast forward to the end of the day... Patient is given a clear liquid tray. Eats a few bites, doing great. Then it hits. And the nausea begins. And this poor patient becomes absolutely miserable. And what's worse, is that hearing her vomit, seeing the look of pain on her face, and smelling the bile, brought it all back for me.

I have been miserable ever since. And by miserable, I mean I have been running to the bathroom all night, and I would almost think I grew another dysfunctional gallbladder.

Before my problems, hearing someone vomit would have me retching along with them. Now I realized I vomited enough to make that not borrow me quite as much.

On a positive note, I'm watching the MLB All-Stars game, and the NL just won. Yay! An it also helps that my favorite player got to be at the game. Even though I wanna stay up and watch the post game stuff, it looks like I'm gonna have to read about it in the morning.

G'Night y'all!