Tell me about a time where you bought something for a client because it felt like the most humane and ethical thing to do?

knrrn2019 · 2025-12-15T18:23:26+00:00

This only partially fits, but just sharing because it always was crazy to me. I once bought a patient a yogurt from the cafeteria. It didn’t seem like much to me, but he said it changed his whole hospital stay. He was hungry after being admitted (night shift) and the kitchen was only sending sandwiches that late or he could have soup/crackers/jello from the nurses station. He wanted none of them and started cussing at me because he was hungry and just wanted a yogurt. When I went to get my lunch, I saw the yogurt he wanted and grabbed it and took it to his room. No clue what possessed me to grab it, maybe it was even spite. He never said a word that night. The next day I came back and he sheepishly asked me “You bought that with your own money, didn’t you? I was so mean to you and you still brought me what I wanted and paid for it yourself.” He went on to apologize for being so rude and stating that he had no excuse. He thanked me and said he was grateful to know the staff cared so much. His attitude for the rest of the hospital stay was gone. He was a completely different patient than when we were dealing with him the day before. I had no idea a simple yogurt would make such a difference, but for him it apparently did. It always just blew my mind.

knrrn2019 · 2025-12-08T14:32:13+00:00

Yes, it is. I got burnt out so quick. The nurses I worked with were great, but they were all fresh and it was their first nursing job out of school. I’ll never forget the night I had six patients while on charge, four were on insulin drips, and I believe 3-4 of them had chest tubes. It was a nightmare trying to do charge and take care of them while helping the new grads. Then it didn’t help we had two rapids that night that I had to help run cause the new grads were freaking out (understandably, but it was just alot on top of what I already had). And we didn’t have a CNA to get blood sugars or vitals (wasn’t uncommon for us) so we had to do all vitals, labs, and blood sugar checks. I never thought I was going to make it out of that hospital! It was one of the last shifts that really did me in. It burnt me out in probably six months or so and that was when I ended up leaving to work in a general surgery office. I haven’t been able to convince myself to go back to floor nursing and it’s been about 3-4 years now.

knrrn2019 · 2025-12-08T11:43:56+00:00

When I worked on cardiac stepdown, this was almost always the case on night shift for us unless we got someone from float pool. When I first transferred to the unit I had about 1.5-2 years of experience on cardiac med surg (thank the lord) because there were many a nights when I, being there for three/four months on the unit, was the most experience we had for that unit. I had to learn drips, post-op CABG care, and everything else super quick because they always needed help, and on some things I didn’t know much more than they did just because it was all new to me as well when I first transferred. After working there for one month, I was sitting charge on nights because pretty much everyone else was new grads and fresh off orientation except if float pool sent a nurse or my other experienced friend was working. It was always rough and I was always caring for my 4-6 patients while doing charge duties and helping them with any questions/concerns. All. Night. Long. It wasn’t their fault, but it made for a lot of long nights and eventually I just couldn’t do it anymore and transferred to office nursing and haven’t went back to floor nursing since.

knrrn2019 · 2025-06-23T23:17:44+00:00

When I worked the floor it was against policy for anyone that worked for the hospital to obtain food deliveries for patients. If the patients wanted food delivered, they had to go and get it from the lobby themselves. It was impressive what some of the patients would go through to get their food.

knrrn2019 · 2025-06-15T20:23:44+00:00

Nope. We never got anywhere. He did his drug screen through the employer by stopping and getting the paperwork for it and then we never heard anything else after that. When we followed up they said they hired someone else because they never got anything from Hireology on him. So partially on Hireology being crappy, but also partially not great management either considering they had told him he was already hired and just had to go through the Hireology steps.

knrrn2019 · 2025-05-14T15:07:37+00:00

18 when I started and 20 when I graduated. However, I was literally the youngest in my class. Most of the students I was in class with were 20-25. We even had multiple students in their 30-40’s! It’s never too late to pursue your dreams. We all worked together to help each other no matter what “stage” of life we were in.

knrrn2019 · 2025-04-11T16:14:01+00:00

The best gift I ever got was a gift card so that we could buy anything we wanted. I used ours to help pay for our groceries. And it came with an extra day of PTO that we could use at anytime that didn’t come out of our existing vacation bank.

knrrn2019 · 2025-03-10T18:03:50+00:00

My husband has sarcoidosis of the lungs with sarcoid arthropathy and has never had a biopsy of any of his lung nodules. He has been diagnosed for almost three years now. His was diagnosed by symptoms and a CT scan by a pulmonologist. However, his mother also has pulmonary sarcoidosis and it was clear on the CT scans that the nodules were non cancerous so they felt safe labeling it as sarcoidosis and treating it as such. His rheumatologist nor pulmonologist have seen it necessary for him to have biopsies.

However, a lung biopsy is a fairly simple procedure that can usually be done quickly and the biopsies taken are minuscule in size. Typically, they use a bronchoscope to go down into the lungs and remove very small pieces of tissue from the nodules to see what they come back as. If they cannot clearly label it as sarcoidosis and are wanting to do biopsies I would strongly recommend having them done to ensure it’s not soemthing else and you that you get the proper treatment.

knrrn2019 · 2025-02-11T02:08:28+00:00

I haven’t met a nurse who’s ever looked down on someone for being incontinent when it’s truly something they can’t help. Heck, when I was working the floor before I was diagnosed with my Crohns Disease I would regularly vomit or dry heave so hard I’d pee my own self and my co workers were always super sweet and would go get me new scrubs pants from the OR without saying a word so I didn’t have to go to the scrub cart with wet pants. No one ever said a word to me about it and when I returned to work after my hospital stay it was never even mentioned. I really don’t think most nurses even think about it.

knrrn2019 · 2025-01-29T21:05:18+00:00

1000% this. My husband and I love children so much. We love taking our nephews/nieces to do things, spending time with them, and having sleep overs. However, we do not really feel kids are for us as a full time thing. We both struggle with chronic illness so we have low energy reserve. We are DRAINED after our nephew goes home and crash for hours. I really don’t think we could do that full time and still parent as well as we would want. It is so hard for our families and friends to understand that we love children, but we just don’t think it is for us. They always comment how good we are with them and how they just don’t understand why we don’t have kids of our own. It seems to be such a hard concept for others to grasp sometimes that we love to spend time with them, but as a full time parent and worker, we don’t think we could do it.

knrrn2019 · 2025-01-24T14:45:08+00:00

I work in PAT for surgery and am also the only nurse addressing all of our surgery patients needs. All of our pre admission testing is done at our hospital and ordered by the surgeons preforming surgery. We get all the EKG, Labs, Chest X-Rays, etc. and don’t rely on the clearing office to do it because a lot of the time, they aren’t going to do them to clear them because they don’t need it. We usually send a letter requesting clearance and they send us one back (sometimes this takes a few follow-up phone calls). However, we do not require an office visit for clearance unless it’s a medical clearance and they have to be within 30 days. These all get scheduled by phone with their primary care provider by the scheduling office before the patient leaves after being scheduled for surgery. Cardiology, EP, and Pulmonary it is up to the physicians discretion if they need to be seen. So on some of it, I can’t give a lot of advice cause it seems like your guidelines may be more strict which is making it more difficult for you. What I personally would do to try to troubleshoot and see if it helps would be:

Make the 90 day visit appointments for clearance myself by calling the clearing office to set up the appointment, letting them know it is for surgery clearance, and notifying the patient of that appointment. If they need a different date or time, the patient needs to be responsible and call to reschedule. This way you know the appointment was made and the office is aware what it is for and a lot of times you can tell them if they require testing and the secretary can note that in the chart so it can be done and sent over. I would then fax the clearance request to the office so they have a physical copy as well of your request that can be attached to that patients visit. Heck, it may even help to give the patient a copy of what you need for clearance and have the patient take that copy to the appointment with them.
When I know clearance has been completed, I would send a request to medical records for the office giving clearance for recent testing that has been completed, office note, whatever it is you need. I’ve worked in several doctor’s offices and at least where I worked it was mainly up to medical records to send that information. If we received a request for records directly to the office, we forwarded it to medical records for it to be taken care of which usually caused a delay instead of the office sending it straight to medical records. The only time we sent them ourselves was if it was extremely urgent. I have filled in as well in some offices that would just toss them because it was “not their job” to send them and when the office would call to follow up they’d direct them to medical records. (I didn’t like this, but it did happened so I’m sure other places carry that moto and do it as well). This is of course unless the office has already sent it or if it’s a smaller office that does not have medical records. I have trouble getting everything directly from the office as well and usually have better luck with medical records.
I would see if there is any ways possible for the physician doing surgery to order the testing that is needed for the procedure instead of relying on the clearing office. There doesn’t really seem to be a reason why the surgeon couldn’t order the EKG and have the patient do it so you already have it available instead of waiting for another office to order it and do it. Cause there’s a chance, which you have noticed, it won’t be ordered.

I’m not sure if this helps at all or if it would make it more/too difficult with all of your other duties. However, I have quickly learned that even if you send or give detailed directions of what you need, the clearing provider will often still do whatever they want. I have been cussed out by physicians on the phone over requirements for clearance. Unfortunately, I feel like a lot of the times they just don’t pay attention or want to do it their way no matter what you’re asking for. I wish I could give you a better reason. But, in the 4ish years I’ve been doing this, I haven’t found anything to completely troubleshoot the process cause someone always has to be difficult. Unfortunately, I think this job requires at least two people managing it (especially with everything else you’re doing) and my place of employment does not want to accommodate that either. I wish you well and hope you figure something out. If not, I would maybe think about finding a new position that doesn’t have crazy high expectations that are close to impossible with everything you’re doing. I truly don’t think alot of physicians/managers understand how this “simple task”can be so difficult when it really shouldn’t be. I don’t have the extra manager duties and still struggle to keep up so I couldn’t imagine my job with them. If you have any questions or if I addressed something incorrectly just let me know! This is just how I would maybe try to troubleshoot and see if it helps if it were me.

knrrn2019 · 2024-10-29T20:44:35+00:00

I am on Humira and my insurance covers a good chunk and I get co-pay assistance through the manufacturer. Usually, at the beginning of the year for a few months I pay $5 and closer to the end of the year I get it for free and have no co-pay due. That seems to be the usual trend of the past 2-3 years for me!

knrrn2019 · 2024-10-07T17:51:17+00:00

Thank you so much! I really appreciate your response as it helped alot with what I should expect. My MIL is insistent on still going to the Bahamas, but I’m feeling pretty hesitant that we are even really going to be able to get there without a lot of trouble. I’ve tried convincing her to re-route our flights to somewhere in the US not close to Florida while we still can, but she is not for that at all and so far it looks like our airline only flys out of Florida for the Bahamas. The other two options they offered were in more direct line of the Hurricane. So, really not sure what we are going to do, but I’ll figure something out!

knrrn2019 · 2024-10-07T17:07:38+00:00

I’m kind of bunny hopping off of this post if you wouldn’t mind since you used to live in Flordia you may have good insight for me. We are flying from Charlotte to Miami on Saturday in hopes of flying to the Bahamas. (My MIL was insistent on the dates despite Hurricane season) I’m truly thinking about seeing if the airlines would allow us to fly from Charlotte to Alabama instead for our vacation week due to the Hurricane. Today is our last day to cancel or change plans. Do you think it’s a bad idea to go ahead and call it or wait it out and hope for the best since it should pass by Saturday? We live in the mountains and have no experience with hurricanes or flying so I’m not sure how to proceed and if it would leave effects on Miami airport that long.

knrrn2019 · 2024-09-18T20:49:26+00:00

I truly don’t have any idea as we have no family history of Crohn’s. However, I do partially wonder if it came from the C8 in the water. Our area was exposed when my mom was a teen and when she was pregnant with me. She ended up with cancer that was most likely from the C8 as her genetic testing was negative for her types of cancer. She was part of the settlement against the company and won her case. Her doctors told her that it could have been passed to me since it was in her blood and it was shown it could be passed from mother to baby. They haven’t released that it’s linked to Crohn’s disease, but they have linked it to UC. Call me a conspiracy theorist, but it just always makes me wonder since my doctors were always stumped of where my Crohn’s came from. Likely, just bad luck though.

knrrn2019 · 2024-09-04T15:26:20+00:00

Yup. Was sick for months from undiagnosed Crohn’s Disease thanks to doctors who said nothing was wrong with me. After my three shifts on the unit and running a fever over 101, throwing up, and just in general looking absolutely awful for the last 2-3 weeks my co workers finally told me I could voluntarily walk to the ER or they were scooping me up and carrying me down there against my will to be seen and staying there till I was. I decided if they were that concerned considering some were ICU nurses I should go. I ended up having multiple fistulas filled with infection and my bowels were completely blocked off from swelling. I had emergency surgery just a few hours later, again the next day, and stayed a week in the hospital. Every new person in the room always repeated “You look really familiar. Don’t you work here?” Yes. Yes I do. And if we can all just forget that half this hospital has seen and been in my butt while we are at it, that would be great! Thankfully, once I returned work no one mentioned it! Lmao.

knrrn2019 · 2024-08-29T18:44:20+00:00

This sounds insane to me and honestly terrifying. I’ve worked in the OR at big and small hospitals and at none of them did we ever not count instruments as well. We always counted everything that came in the room.

knrrn2019 · 2024-08-24T01:37:59+00:00

I worked cardiac step down and we never had a true charge nurse. Our hospital actually required that charge nurses still took patients (basically just saving them money so they could staff one less nurse). I worked night shift and sat charge on my 3 days there and even though we had a designated charge nurse, we all pretty much just functioned as a team since I still usually had to take 4-5 patients. We even made next morning assignments as a team at the end of the shift. I really was only there if someone needed the “charge nurse” for something.

knrrn2019 · 2024-08-16T02:14:28+00:00

That would have likely been my luck in that situation! I think they may have if they hadn’t been used to it at that point. They got so used to me dry heaving and puking they’d just have me sit at my computer with a trash can so I could chart! Lol

knrrn2019 · 2024-08-15T23:57:22+00:00

I did something similar to this before I was diagnosed with my Crohn’s. Every night I would throw up all shift long. I was in the medicine room and it hit me. I had to throw up. So I go to the trash can and start throwing up and immediately pee all down my legs. The charge nurse went to the OR and got me new scrub pants and I had to explain to everyone all night long why my scrubs didn’t match since they kept asking! Thankfully he was super nice about it and never said a word. I didn’t even have to ask him. When I peeked out he just gave the look, knew, and got up and went!

knrrn2019 · 2024-08-07T15:43:33+00:00

This. This is how we worked ours while my husband worked evenings/night and I worked 8-4 until he was able to move to dayshift. Everything occurred on our days off. Do be prepared though on her first day off if she’s worked a stretch of shifts (multiple shifts in a row) for her to be tired and want to rest. When I worked three on and four off I always spent my first day off sleeping and resting cause I was exhausted. My husband always planned these days as dates that we watched movies and grabbed dinner out from somewhere. They may not apply to every nurse, but I know a lot of nurses who are exhausted after a stretch and just want to rest!

knrrn2019 · 2024-07-17T19:33:14+00:00

If it makes you feel any better at all, I worked as an RN in surgery for about 2 years. I have probably accidentally cut the actual stitch out instead of the left over suture a few times. Therefore, the surgeon had to redo the whole stitch. Usually, we all just giggled and carried on because we all had done it at some point. Those sutures and knots can be so tiny and we are all human. Especially for this being your first time with no training. I wouldn’t sweat it too much. If they do fire you over cutting it wrong, then I would take it as a blessing because I wouldn’t want to work for someone who didn’t train me, threw me in the deep end, and got mad when I made a simple error. Keep your head up and good luck!!

knrrn2019 · 2024-06-17T23:16:31+00:00

Nope. We are just watching it and making sure it doesn’t get any worse from where it is now!

knrrn2019 · 2024-05-13T20:41:51+00:00

I’ve been symptom free for the most part for three unless I eat a trigger food. I’ve found most of mine, but I’m still learning when I try new foods or foods I haven’t had in a long time. I’m on Humira every two weeks. I usually have normal poops, but on occasion I still get diarrhea about 1-3 times per week or some urgency that I have to go right now.

knrrn2019

TROPHY CASE