Beentaggeditis

There's this new thing going around. It's highly contagious. It's called Beentaggeditis. I just "caught" it from my friend and fellow RN student over at Third Degree Nurse.
The only treatment for it is to follow the regime and answer these questions, so here ya go:

Four Jobs I've Had in My Life
1. Cashier at a grocery store (in high school)
2. Manager of a dry cleaners (Never dryclean white cotton!)
3. Server and Bartender at a Casino in Louisiana
4. Coffeemaker at a Seattle's Best turned Starbucks Kiosk (I can't drink regular old Folger's anymore)

Four Movies I Could Watch Over and Over
1. Singin in the Rain (it makes me happy)
2. Moulin Rouge (Ewan + Singing = heaven, Nicole + dying = happiness) lol
3. Reality Bites (to relive my post-HS days)
4. Any of the Alien movies (creepy Aliens and Sigourney kickin butt...woohoo!)

Four Places I Have Lived
1. Northern Ohio (where I was born)
2. Hampton, Virginia (as a kid when Dad was stationed in the Navy)
3. Shreveport, LA (The armpit of LA...HATED IT)
4. A big TX city, where I reside today

Four TV Shows I Love to Watch
1. ER (I don't care what anyone says, I love the drama and it's constantly making me look stuff up)
2. 24 - (Can this show be anymore intense?! Go Jack Go!)
3. American Idol - (where was this show when I was young enough to audition?)
4. Scrubs - (Not medically accurate at all, but who cares? It freaking funny!)

Four Places I've Been on Vacation
1. Hampton, VA (Yeah, it sucks that all my vacations revolve around seeing family)
2. Melbourne, Florida (Again....family)
3. Galveston, TX (Went to Moody Gardens WITH family)
4. Northern Ohio (That darn Family)

Four Websites I Visit Daily
1. My blog
2. Pogo (what can I say, I love the mindless games, excellent relaxation for the noggin)
3. My "blackboard" school website
4. Various other blogs I have listed to the right

Four of My Favorite Foods
1. Fettucine Alfredo
2. Cheeseburgers
3. Cheesecake (Can ya tell I like cheese?)
4. Coffee (Yes, in my world, it counts as food!)

Four Places I'd Rather Be Right Now
1. England
2. Ireland
3. Scotland
4. New York, NY

Four Most Wonderful Places I've Ever Been
1. Here, the city I live in, is an awesome place to be (Biased, I know)
2. Virginia Beach, VA (Really nice beach)
3. Williamsburg, VA (in the fall, it's gorgeous!)
4. DisneyWorld, Florida (For lack of anywhere better, I need to go again as an adult and experience the things my cheapskate parents jipped me of)

Four Books I Read Over and Over
1. All the Harry Potter books (silly huh?)
2. Medical-Surgical Nursing by Lamone (because I have to)
3. Sorry that's all I got right now, it's been awhile since I've done any recreational reading

Four Songs I listen to Over and Over Again
1. Anything by Tori Amos
2. Anything by Sarah McLauchlan
3. "Down so long" by Jewel (I can sing this one perfectly, she's in my octave)
4. "Just like Heaven" by The Cure (reminds me of you-know-who)

Four Reasons Why I Blog
1. I've kept a diary since 6th grade (might as well make it public?)
2. I'm hoping others can learn from me. (and from my mistakes)
3. I need more outlets to vent (I can't put ALL that burden on my friends)
4. People keep stopping by and reading this darn thing (I'm obligated. lol)

Four people I tag to do this
1. GlacierMeow
2. Student Nurse Jack
3. Sublimely Mundane
4. Windfall Woman

Listening to: "I Alone" by Live, Throwing Copper

Worst test in history

Today I took the worst test in the history of Nursing school tests. It was SUPPOSED to be mostly Neuro; CVA, aneurysms, Intracranial pressure, shock, Brain herniations, and it also had some cardio valvular disorders on it. MOST of the class....at least 50%....failed it. Even our A students made Cs or failed it. The one girl I know who made a 90 (which counts as a B), said she got it by "lucky guessing". I made a 78.
One example of the questions (Not a real one) went like this:
Patient X is A and O x 1, P 60, RR20, BP 95/60 has no complaints of pain, Urine output is 35 ml/hr. Which of the following can be assessed:
a. Glascow coma scale 12
b. GCS 13
c. GCS 14
d. GCS 15

With poorly worded and vague questions like that how could anyone have passed?!

There wasn't one question over CVAs despite the 4 hour lecture over it, yet there were like 5 or 6 craniotomy questions of which we never covered in class and there's a brief blurb about it in our text.

In the test review after we all tried to argue these questions to no avail.....It was like talking to a bunch of stubborn brick walls. Today 4 instructors with Master's degrees in Nursing let a class of 46 down....big time.

Listening To: Puedo Escribir by Sixpence none the richer

Locked out & a patient died

Short audio post today about being locked out and having a patient die on my watch.

Listening to: "Sweet Sangria" Tori Amos, Scarlet's Walk

HESI

HESI : Health Education Systems, Inc:
"Health Education Systems, Inc. (HESI) provides critical thinking, computerized exams for nurses. The model described in Critical Thinking and Test Item Writing by Morrison, Smith, and Britt is used to develop test items for all HESI Exams."

My Exit exam was today, testing my knowledge from school and giving me a good idea of how I'll do on the NCLEX

Out of 1158 possible points, I made an 1120.... 97%
A passing score is 850

Which means I have a 97.58% chance of passing the NCLEX today.

So...Yay Me!
********
Listening to: Tori Amos "Sweet the Sting" The Beekeeper album

Spring break is gone :( & Cave pictures

I was going to do another audio today, but it's too loud in here right now. The "Fairly odd parents" are being way too noisy. Soooo.... Spring Break is over and that sucks. I did, however, get everything done that I said I would get done. I did clean my house and my fridge. I finished my Lymphoma case study, research paper, and my resume. I did all those things in the last 48 hours but Hey, I did it. Back to the grind tomorrow....Yet another Neuro lecture. I'm about to become NEUROlogically impaired if I sit through any more Neuro lectures. Me and my monster visited some local caverns today. (Yes! On top of everything else...we visited Caverns!) Enjoy some pics, with the high humidity, I'm surprised at how good they turned out.


The blue lights indicate the cave goes at least 50 feet more

The "Moon" pool and my daughter's head.

We are 70 feet underground here

The ceiling at one point, carved by an underground river

A Flow rock, water was gently flowing on it.

I love this pic, Stalagtites, Stalagmites, &

Limestone, Oh my!

I took this of a really deep hole...not sure what

the reflection is but could be Bat eyes...One buzzed me.

"Soda Straws"

The call that center formation "Draperies"

Grand Rounds 2:25

What can raise your site counter drastically?

What can bring people from all over the world to your blog?

What can bring a smile to the face of medical professional bloggers everywhere?

Grand Rounds 2:25, That's what!

Over at the previously mentioned Geek Nurse.

(Yes I have a submission in this one too, I wrote one on theme. Shameless, huh?)

Groundbreaking

Drumroll please........Jodi's voice starring in it's very first audio blog.

I got the idea from Geek nurse. He's a clever guy.

Tell me what ya think.

Sound like me?

Ok, You tell me....does it sound like me?

Advanced Global Personality Test Results Extraversion 56% Stability 56% Orderliness 40% Accommodation 70% Interdependence 56% Intellectual 43% Mystical 10% Artistic 10% Religious 43% Hedonism 56% Materialism 63% Narcissism 36% Adventurousness 10% Work ethic 50% Self absorbed 50% Conflict seeking 10% Need to dominate 16% Romantic 76% Avoidant 16% Anti-authority 16% Wealth 30% Dependency 30% Change averse 30% Cautiousness 50% Individuality 30% Sexuality 70% Peter pan complex 36% Physical security 70% Physical Fitness 10% Histrionic 16% Paranoia 23% Vanity 10% Hypersensitivity 70% Female cliche 70%

Take Free Advanced Global Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

Stability results were moderately high which suggests you are relaxed, calm, secure, and optimistic.
Orderliness results were moderately low which suggests you are, at times, overly flexible, improvised, and fun seeking at the expense of reliability, work ethic, and long term accomplishment.
Extraversion results were moderately high which suggests you are, at times, overly talkative, outgoing, sociable and interacting at the expense of developing your own individual interests and internally based identity.

trait snapshot:
messy, disorganized, not rule conscious, rebellious, rash, weird, ambivalent about chaos, likes bizarre things, anti-authority, not good at saving money, not a perfectionist, leaves many things unfinished, low self control, strange, desires more attention, romantic daydreamer, abstract, impractical, unproductive, leisurely, likes the unknown

The Good and the Ugly

I have had good days and bad days in Nursing school and as well in my work as an nursing asst. My good days were really those days when I left there feeling like I really made an impact and helped someone.

One good day was when I did my pediatric rotation. I got an 18 month old born with a Cytomegalovirus infection, Hepatitis C, and he was definitely cognitively delayed. But that's not why he was there. He was there because his guardian broke his leg, a spiral fracture. Those of you in the Med field and social work field know there aren't too many accidental causes for a spiral fracture in an 18 month old. He was such a joy though. He made you smile when you walked into a room. He was constantly smiling. He loved playing PeekaBoo. Sadly, Since his birth he'd gone from family member to family member. This last "Guardian" would be his last. He was discharged to foster parents, whom I met and they seemed very attentive and loving people. He was finally going to be loved and I got to love him for 2 shifts. That's why it was a good day.

OH but the bad days can be BAD. Not unlike the bad day I had in second semester. I made the mistake of telling this patient I was holding his blood pressure med. I shouldn't say mistake, It's only right to inform patients on their meds, but in hindsight, I should have maybe phrased it differently or something.
The drug was Cardizem, an Anti-hypertensive, and I was holding it because the Patient's BP was something like 90/50 and his heart rate was borderline at around 58. This is what I'm supposed to do, if I had given the drug, his BP could've dropped even lower, and would've been very dangerous. So I walk in with his other meds and explain the situation and I explained why and everything. He suddenly started cussing at me! This was a middle aged, middle income seemingly pleasant man until I told him I was going to do something that could keep him from dying. The other nurses could hear him out in the hall. (Now I'm OK with the mentally unstable cussing at me, I see that often at work. It really gets me when the mentally stable get verbally violent)
I paged my instructor as the patient was demanding I bring him his medicine. She went in with me to explain again and although, not cussing this time, he was still rude. I was brought to tears by the situation, frustration, and the demeaning way he treated me.
His demeanor had changed with me as soon as he found out I was a student. This is not something we hide from patients and it is usually added to our introduction (Not to mention the big ole patch on my arm that says STUDENT). He was nicer to the staff, he just thought I had no idea what I was talking about.

We students have no problem with patients denying our services. Not everyone wants to be a guinea pig for us. We understand. So, I make this plea to you, my readers. If you ever find yourself hospitalized and a student walks into your room, please tell them right away if you have a problem with them caring for you and please don't keep quiet and then treat them with disrespect.

Personally, as a patient, I would love to have a student. We students only have a couple of patients (2 or 3) at most versus our staff nurses who have 5, 6, or 7 patients. Sometimes, We have to do extensive research on your diagnosis, lab results, and medications. We also have to do EVERYTHING by the book and depending on our level, with our instructor (With their Master's degrees) watching. It can be like having your own private nurse for a shift.

Grand rounds

Kim over at Emergiblog is hosting Grand Rounds 2:24 (Redux) this week. Yours truly has made my very first submission.
For those of you who are not into medical blogging and don't know, Grand Rounds is a weekly post of links to a variety of blogs in the Medicoblogosphere. In other words, Medical professionals blogging about their jobs and lives.
I'm honored to have my first at Emergiblog, Kim truly is a gifted writer and from what it seems, a talented Nurse.

ICU and photo op

I've been busy. That's the only excuse I can come up with for not posting in more then a few days. Clinicals went well last week and I get to go to the ICU this Wednesday. I'm a little apprehensive about it as there is SO MUCH more going on in the ICU. Since my experience has been predominantly Med/Surg floors, the mere thought of ventilators, arterial lines, and rotating beds really scares the socks off me. Hopefully it will be an educational experience though, unlike my ER experience.

I have an interesting "thing" I'm doing tomorrow. When I worked a shift last week at my hospital, our staff educator approached me about doing a Photo shoot for a promotional thing. She already had a few nurses onboard but need a few CAs as well. I don't know why she picked me as we have quite a few much cuter and younger CAs on my floor but maybe it's the whole RN school thing. Ya know, they can say "This is Jodi, CA II who works on the blah blah floor, she's about to graduate RN school." I think it probably looks pretty good for a hospital to show off someone like me who moved up from Clerk to RN.....and still want to work for them when they could go anywhere else.
I met a CA the other day, a really good one I should add, that started as a Housekeeper. She was telling me she wanted to go to Nursing school. She was apprehensive saying she shouldn't in her 40s but I tried to talk her into it. There are quite a few 40 somethings and 30 somethings in my class, I would say the majority. Anyhoo, I'll let you know how that goes.
I've also been busy having taken on the task of planning our class photos. I remember when I started this journey I went to an information seminar on the program. I must have spent 30 minutes in the main hall looking at all the graduates photos. I was mainly looking for people at the hospital I knew but I also couldn't wait until my picture was in that hall.
Well this year, without any announcement, the school decided to stop organizing the photos. So I took matters into my own hands and have scheduled a photographer to come out and take our pics and put them into a compilation we can buy and give to the school. This guy actually does youth sports league photos but he's gonna come out and do a photo shoot at our school after class. We, students went through 4 semesters of near hell, so if it kills me, we are gonna be on that wall, DagNabbit!

Oncology

My oncology experience today:

He wasn't young but he wasn't old either. It started with "sinus" pain and pressure off and on for a couple of weeks. Then he started having confusion symptoms, for example, he would see a supermarket and recognize it as a building but not a supermarket. That's when he saw his doctor. The doctor wanted to run a CT scan but his insurance denied it. A few weeks later the pain became unbearable and he went straight to the Emergency room. They did a CT and low and behold found a brain tumor in the Occipital area of his brain. Surgeons decided to operate and removed parts of the tumor (but not all) via Craniotomy. Radiation was planned. Just 11 days later, he was rushed again to the ER, The fast growing tumor grew back and was larger then it was when it was partially resected. It was causing spinal fluid to build up and he developed intercranial pressure. His Doctors decided this time to go in and put in a shunt to relieve the pressure. During surgery he hemorrhaged too quickly and hasn't woken up since.
This tumor was related to B Cell Lymphoma, a nasty Cancer that works fast.
I spent a lot of time with his family today as they just recently decided that Hospice was the best route. He is unresponsive, paralyzed completely on one side, and the other side is posturing. His Urine output is decreasing, he has copious mucus secretions, his breathing is shallow and irregular. I'm not sure he'll be there when I get back tomorrow. I think my main focus will be to keep him comfortable and focus a little more on the family, His wife and his small children.

Boy, this hit close to home. But I have an understanding that maybe some of the other nurses don't. I enjoyed helping this patient and his family today. This disease process fascinates me. Enough so that I plan to do my Case study over B Cell Lymphoma. If I wasn't staying on at my current med/surg unit, I would say Oncology would be my second specialty of choice.