2nd Day of Nursing Clinicals

I didn't leave today with the same warm inside feeling that I did last week. I had to do my first head-to-toe assessment on a patient today. We haven't really been given a lot of learning opportunities on this. It is one thing to do one and have your student watch, or teach them about they can approach it so they feel comfortable doing it themselves. So, its my fault, I should have tried to practice this more on my own, but I honestly didn't quite know where to start.

So, my patient today was really nice, and didn't complain as I completely mangled my assessment. I forgot my anti-anxiety pill today, so the anxiety was at full force. I couldn't find the apical pulse so I gave up, I had trouble getting the bp cuff on securely because I have never taken a blood pressure on someone who was in bed....and I didn't like the hospital BP cuff that was attached to the wall....it didn't give me enough reach. I am guessing that is because NO ONE USES THEM. They have these lovely automatic vital sign carts where the machine does all the work for you. And I was completely flustered after feeling like a dumb-dumb with the BP, that the rest of the assessment was probably stressful for me and the patient.

Luckily, the patient was a good sport. I got to go along with him as he had a diagnostic procedure done and got to do a lot of chatting with him. He was a very nice man. I also was able to pass medications for the first time today. I only had to give a few medications, so it wasn't too bad. I am kinda excited, kinda terrified about the possibility of giving an injection on a patient for the first time next Friday, when we are just learning it on Tuesday!! I was definitely be at school practicing that one!!

Side note, I am pretty sure my nurse could have cared less if I was there or not. So I basically opted to stay out of her way as much as possible unless it had to do with the patient that I was assigned to. I guess I don't blame her, they are busy people, but she hardly even tried to teach me anything.

So, I vowed to get my evaluation done before I did anything else when I got home, but I am utterly exhausted, and I think I would cry if I tried to put myself through the self-evaluation process right now especially considering I didn't feel like I was on top of my game today. =(