12 lead EKG’s and axis deviations.
Gewwd times.
Archive for the ‘health’ Category
I’m quite the visual learner
Posted by Sean on January 27, 2012
Posted in health, humor | 2 Comments »
Visiting hours?
Posted by Sean on January 18, 2012
Should there be visiting hours in the ICU? Or should it be open with no restrictions?
A recent article at Nurse.com sparked my interest. Limited (or scheduled) visitation versus unlimited visitation hours?
As a nurse, the reflex answer should be: Whatever is better for the patient.
I honestly feel anything that can improve the delivery of care is a good thing, but you’ll be hard pressed to find many nurses who are advocates of unlimited visiting hours.
It’s a touchy subject, isn’t it? I don’t think anyone is completely for or against either choice.
The article (AACN calls for expanding visitation rights in ICU) says:
Hospitals may limit visiting hours under the assumption that family visitation causes stress for the patient, interferes with the provision of care, is mentally exhausting to patients and families or contributes to increased infections.
Other than the increased infections, I’d agree with that statement…….
A recent blog I posted over at Scrubs. Go clickety-click and read the original post.
Posted in health | Tagged: ICU | 7 Comments »
Need Surgery : Is a more experienced surgeon better?
Posted by Sean on January 12, 2012
Once again, this was a weak study design. But, it sure does raise some eyebrows doesn’t it?
I think having the experience is paramount, but does the experienced surgeon grow with the changing face of medicine? Experience can be a tricky thing.
Previous studies have shown doctors reach their peak performance levels after about 10 years of experience in their specialty. Few studies have looked at the association between experience and performance in an objective manner. The intent of this study was to model the associations between experience and outcomes among surgeons performing thyroid procedures.
Read the entire story here: via Medical News: Older Surgeons May Not Be Better Surgeons – in Surgery, General Surgery from MedPage Today.
Posted in health, opinion | Tagged: surgery | Leave a Comment »
Your career. Six words. Go
Posted by Sean on January 4, 2012
It’s an interesting question: If you had to sum up your career thus far in just one brief sentence, what would those words be?
My answer was almost immediate. I remember reading something about “gut” reactions–usually your immediate answer is the most honest. The lack of time to ponder removes any false motivation or external validation. (FYI, that immediate answer is almost always the correct answer to a multiple choice question on an exam.)
What’s even more interesting is my answer has remained the same throughout my ENTIRE career, from start to present. That’s six years and counting!
My sentence apply to all of the following …
…
This was a post over at scrubs that succinctly defines my career in just 6 words. Hop on over and read the entire post.
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The holidays and nurses…
Posted by Sean on January 1, 2012
We nurses sometimes forget to separate our personal lives from our work ones.
For some reason, we tend to socialize with the very same people we work with (or used to work with), or we socialize with fellow healthcare professionals (Docs, EMTs, Medics, RTs, etc.).
It’s neither good nor bad–until we’re not around them but continue to act like we are.
Here are some tips to keep in mind this holiday season:
Refrain from talking about work at the dinner table
Yes, contrary to what you may believe, there actually are people out there who cannot talk about bodily fluids, blood, and drainage while shoving food in their mouths. Call me crazy, but slurping down cranberry sauce while discussing bloody wounds is not what most people call normal. Besides, you’d rather be enjoying your time off from work than resuscitating a family member who fainted.
Try actually tasting the food
Try not to eat your meal with the same “hot-rod racing style” that you do when you’re at work. Most of us don’t get a full-fledged traditional meal break, so we eat on the go, on the fly, or while we are still moving. Some of us inhale our food so fast, we forget what the heck we ate. I’ve uttered the phrase, “I’ll taste it later.” This is that rare occasion when you can eat at a normal pace, so give a try!
Cutlery improvisation
Whatever you do, I mean, whatever you do–if the supply of utensils is low, please do not break out the tongue blades, urimeters and other equipment to aid in your feast. Once again, it’s not normal to eat your food with a piece of equipment used to examine the back of the throat, or drink from something that normally collects a bodily fluid. Please refer back to family members fainting.
Native tongue
This goes right along with the bodily fluids topic. The minute you start speaking in medical mnemonics, you’re more than likely going to get that glazed over stare and be asked to explain yourself. Play it safe and avoid them altogether.
Maybe I’m the only one who has had to follow these tips? One thing’s for sure, the holidays are always entertaining when there’s a nurse around.
A post from over at Scrubs taking a humorous look at nurses and the holidays.
Posted in health, humor | Tagged: holiday, nurses, scrubsmag | Leave a Comment »
ANA & Medicare participation terms | RNs & APRNs
Posted by Sean on December 29, 2011
The ANA also expressed support for the following CMS proposals that directly affect nursing practice and patient care for the roughly 60% of U.S. RNs who work in hospitals:
• Allowing the nursing care plan to be part of the interdisciplinary care plan.
• Expanding the use of standing orders and protocols for nurses to give medications.
• Permitting patients to take their own medications under certain circumstances.
• Deleting the requirement for verbal orders to be signed within 48 hours.
• Allowing flexibility for infection control programs, which nurses often lead.
To see the current CMS Conditions of Participation for hospitals, visit http://go.cms.gov/uKSLVy.
via ANA supports changes to Medicare participation terms | National Nursing News.
It’s a slow, long hard battle, but it seems to be happening one piece at a time. Read the entire post over at National Nursing News.
Posted in health | Tagged: ANA, APRN, Medicare, nurse | Leave a Comment »
Too Intensive Care | Survey Says?
Posted by Sean on December 29, 2011
Care for the critically ill may go too far for nearly a quarter of the patients in intensive care units, according to the physicians and nurses who care for them.
Clinicians felt they administered inappropriate care for 23% of patients treated in a single day across a subset of 69 ICUs in which patient data could be linked to clinician questionnaires, Ruth D. Piers, MD, of Ghent University Hospital in Ghent, Belgium, and colleagues found.
Among the full complement of survey respondents, 25% of 1,218 ICU nurses and 32% of 407 ICU physicians said they delivered inappropriate care to at least one of their patients on the day of the survey.
The most common reason cited — by 65% of respondents — was care disproportionate to the patient’s situation, nearly always “too much care,” the group reported in the Dec. 28 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.
“Clinicians in ICUs who perceive the care they provide as inappropriate experience moral distress and are at risk for burnout,” they wrote. “This situation may jeopardize patient quality of care and increase staff turnover.”
While concerning, the study offered only a “hazy” picture of why and what can or should be done about it, cautioned an accompanying editorial by Scott D. Halpern, MD, PhD, of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
Clinician opinion hasn’t previously been considered relevant in determining whether the care delivered is the care that should be delivered, he noted.
And the validity of this subjective endpoint isn’t clear, Halpern added.
OK, so it’s an observational survey from a very small sample size (less than 100 ICU units and less than 500 ICU patients), but it definitely gets your attention. I like these type of ‘studies’ (if that’s what you want to call them), because it’s not really giving any valid empirical evidence for practice change, but is could be the preamble to something bigger or better.
I’m pretty sure there are plenty of ICU nurses out there that would have some great input regarding ‘too intensive’ care. End of life care seems to be blurring the lines between life-saving, life-sustaining, and death-prolonging these days.
What do you think? Follow the link and read the full article.
Posted in health, opinion | Tagged: end of life, ICU, nurses | 1 Comment »
The sixth (sick) sense
Posted by Sean on December 24, 2011
Nurses do indeed have a sixth sense. No, I didn’t misspell “sick” sense. I mean, we have an instinct that civilians don’t have.
The nursing “sixth sense” is that moment when your gut gets those “butterflies,” or when A plus B does not equal C.
It’s a part of that ever-important skillset of critical thinking, but it’s also a separate entity altogether. Maybe you can call it a form of ESP:
ESP is also sometimes casually referred to as a sixth sense, gut instinct or hunch, which are historical English idioms. The term implies acquisition of information by means external to the basic limiting assumptions of science, such as that organisms can only receive information from the past to the present.
So. ESP. It’s one of those skills that seasoned nurses just “have.” I’m not sure if it’s something we witness, repeat, learn, see, or simply acquire through experience. Maybe it’s just that tried and true “learn as you go” skill? Honestly, I really don’t know how it’s acquired, I just know it exists.
In fact, I’m more sure than ever after this past semester of classes. This “instinct” was referenced several times during my clinical rotation and during a couple lectures in the nurse practitioner program I’m attending.
The question was posed, “Does the patient look sick?”
……. follow the link to read the rest:
A recent post from over at Scrubs Magazine. Any thoughts???
Posted in health | 4 Comments »
Christmas Eve in the Hospital…
Posted by Sean on December 24, 2011
What is it like in a hospital on Christmas Eve? Find out in this very special Christmas holiday edition of Happy’s Xtranormal Theatre titled Twas the Night Before Christmas in the Hospital.
via Twas the Night Before Christmas in the Hospital (Xtranormal Education!).
A big thanks to Happy the Hospitalist for this one. Merry Christmas!
Like this:
Posted in health, humor | Leave a Comment »
Thousands of California nurses stage a one-day strike
Posted by Sean on December 23, 2011
Robert Galbraith / Reuters
Nurses participate in a one day strike at a hospital in Burlingame, Calif. on December 22, 2011. The strike affects 2,000 RNs at Long Beach Memorial Medical Center and Miller Children’s Hospital in Long Beach, and 4,000 RNs who work at nine Bay Area facilities that are part of the Sutter Health Corporation. The nurses are protesting what they call unsafe nurse-to-patient staffing ratios and increases in their health care premiums.
Thousands of California nurses stage a one-day strike
The National Nurses United website reports – Voicing concern over the erosion of quality of care and cuts to patient protections, nurses are on a one-day strike today at California’s second largest private hospital and one of its most profitable corporate hospital chains.
RNs have been at odds with hospital management for months over assuring there is safe RN-to-patient staffing at all times, and over the hospital’s refusal to implement safe patient lift policies to prevent accidents to patients and injuries to nurses, despite enactment of a state law requiring such policy.
Long Beach nurses will also protest hospital demands for sweeping increases in healthcare premiums for nurses. The health care takeaway the hospital is pushing would cost RNs nearly $3,000 more out of pocket in premium costs, even though the hospital’s costs for nurses’ health coverage have not risen. Read more…
via PhotoBlog – Thousands of California nurses stage a one-day strike.
I hope their voices get heard.
Posted in health | 1 Comment »
