Much Better

I am even better now. I still have some painful spots like around my feet and left shoulder as well as my hands. I don't know if I actually said that I had three doctors give me their opinion on what has been wrong with me. They all three agree that it is the coxsackie virus. It should eventually go away altogether. But it is taking it's sweet time. I do well as long as I don't overdo it. But, on Thursdays when I have clinical all day, I over do it. Then on Fridays I am in pain. So, I just try not to do too much when I don't have to. Sorry I have focused so much on this lately but it really scared the bee-jeezus out of me.

Clinical this week could not have been better. I picked my patient and we did preplan but we did not have to complete the entire Clinical Worksheet (CWS). The CWS takes about 7 hours to complete. So it was great that we didn't have to completely do them. We did have to do another form about communication. But that was a breeze.

My two classmates and I went in to preplan on Wednesday morning. We got a print out of all the patients on the floor from the unit secretary. We sat down and looked over that. We each picked a patient. Then we got a print out of the patient's Kardex, pull their paper chart and find a computer. It is sometimes hard to get on a computer in the mornings because that is when the doctors are there and they use them. We finally found one we could all three share. We fill in the CWS with all the patient information like name, age, gender, diagnosis, etc. We also write down all the drugs and the times they will be due during our shift. Once we have all the information we need we go in and meet the patient. My patient was great. She and her husband were very nice. I told her I would be back the next day to be her student nurse.

After that I went back home and looked up all the drugs. I filled all that information into the CWS. I looked up her diagnosis' so I know what is going on with her. On Thursday morning I got to the hospital at 6:45 a.m. I found my nurse and stayed with her. The first thing the nurses do is hear report from the night nurse. I sat in on that. It is very interesting to hear what they say about all the patients. After report I went in and took care of my patient. Once she was set, I stayed with my nurse for all her patients. She talked me through everything she was doing. It was such a great learning experience. I got to give two sub-Q injections, lots of PO meds and watched a PICC line be placed in my patient's arm. The PICC line placement was very interesting. It was done by an RN and she talked me through it. She is specialized and only does PICC lines all day. She's done it for three years and is great at it. We left the floor at 11:30 to go to a wound care in-service downstairs. It was interesting and informative. Then we went back to the lab at school and learned about trach care and suctioning.

Monday we have that big test so I'll be studying, studying, studying. Hopefully I will do well on that. I predict I'll make somewhere around an 86. That seems to be the norm for me. 86 to 88.