(no subject)
It’s kind of scary sometimes when you think about someone’s life is in your hands when you’re at the hospital. Especially when it’s your turn to give out meds. We’re supposed to check and recheck, and then recheck again. And after you think you were being so careful and meticulous about them, you find out you might have done something wrong. It’s scary to think about making a mistake. The other day I was giving meds. I checked them on the orders, made sure I had the right drug, the right dose, right route, right time and the right patient. Then I checked compatibility because I was giving an IV push, along with hanging other IV piggybacks. And I thought everything looked good. So I gave my meds, my IVs, and my IV push. A little later I went to look up some of my meds for the next round. For whatever reason I went back to the IV meds I gave and checked compatibility again. One of them had “caution: variable” meaning the reactions with the two could potentially be incompatible. It’s a terrifying feeling. Your heart just drops. You feel the blood run from your face. You get nauseous. And then you just wish you didn’t wake up this morning at 545, because sleeping in and missing clinical might be better than accidentally hurting your patient. What do you do? What can you do?
I went to my nurse and I told her what had happened. We checked the IV compatibility on Micromedex and confirmed what I saw. We checked the patient (who was fine, no changes), and then I went to talk to my instructor. I was ready to get sent home, to fail clinical, drop out, and then go back home to figure out what to do with my life. Maybe live on the beach in a grass hut? I know I was exaggerating and thinking too far ahead, but when you’re panicking and unsure of what to do, your mind goes in every direction at once. So when I talked to my instructor, I showed her what I found and waited for judgment. And luckily, the meds were compatible. I didn’t mix meds incorrectly. I didn’t almost hurt my patient. And thankfully, my instructor knew what she was doing and wouldn’t let us make these kinds of mistakes. So as annoying as it might be sometimes to wait to give our meds with our instructor, there are benefits to it. Sometimes it’s necessary. Maybe some people are perfect in everything they do and never make mistakes. I’m not one of those people. I think sometimes we are driven to do everything so perfectly, that little details need to be exact, and then find ourselves missing something really big because we’re too into the little things. Or maybe it’s the pressure that we put on ourselves to do everything exactly and correctly, that make us miss something so obvious. And as scary as it is, at some point we’ll make a mistake. Hopefully something bad doesn’t come of it. All we can do is try to do our best, not scary ourselves into being the most perfect nurse ever, and make ourselves think about what we’re doing. If you have a question or unsure of something, just go ask. If you don’t feel comfortable doing something, ask someone to help. I was lucky, really really lucky. It could have been a lot worse. But as students, we don’t have all the answers. We’ll make mistakes. And the best thing we can do is learn from them. So if you don’t already know, phenergan doesn’t go with Ringer’s Lactate (my patient had KCL). But make sure to double check!
i dont think ive ever been more scared in my life.
I went to my nurse and I told her what had happened. We checked the IV compatibility on Micromedex and confirmed what I saw. We checked the patient (who was fine, no changes), and then I went to talk to my instructor. I was ready to get sent home, to fail clinical, drop out, and then go back home to figure out what to do with my life. Maybe live on the beach in a grass hut? I know I was exaggerating and thinking too far ahead, but when you’re panicking and unsure of what to do, your mind goes in every direction at once. So when I talked to my instructor, I showed her what I found and waited for judgment. And luckily, the meds were compatible. I didn’t mix meds incorrectly. I didn’t almost hurt my patient. And thankfully, my instructor knew what she was doing and wouldn’t let us make these kinds of mistakes. So as annoying as it might be sometimes to wait to give our meds with our instructor, there are benefits to it. Sometimes it’s necessary. Maybe some people are perfect in everything they do and never make mistakes. I’m not one of those people. I think sometimes we are driven to do everything so perfectly, that little details need to be exact, and then find ourselves missing something really big because we’re too into the little things. Or maybe it’s the pressure that we put on ourselves to do everything exactly and correctly, that make us miss something so obvious. And as scary as it is, at some point we’ll make a mistake. Hopefully something bad doesn’t come of it. All we can do is try to do our best, not scary ourselves into being the most perfect nurse ever, and make ourselves think about what we’re doing. If you have a question or unsure of something, just go ask. If you don’t feel comfortable doing something, ask someone to help. I was lucky, really really lucky. It could have been a lot worse. But as students, we don’t have all the answers. We’ll make mistakes. And the best thing we can do is learn from them. So if you don’t already know, phenergan doesn’t go with Ringer’s Lactate (my patient had KCL). But make sure to double check!
i dont think ive ever been more scared in my life.