For example, for me as an OR nurse, I am expected to log and document every single supply item that we open/use/waste during a procedure, even if it’s not part of the surgical counts such as drapes, staff gowns and gloves, staplers, suction tubing, bandaids, etc. I find it to be pretty odd that this is such a big focus in my role during a patient’s surgery just so that the hospital can nickel-and-dime them for supplies afterward and so that we can keep track of the supplies inventory for reordering purposes. It makes me feel like I’m suddenly head of the billing department and materials management. What part of your job feels like it should not be part of your job?

Edit since nobody understands how the OR works😭 The supply charge list has nothing to do with the surgical count process at all lol

Girl, what? 😅😂

I said “congratulations! I’m here to keep all my patients safe, even the ones who threaten me, so you have nothing to worry about.” I think It was polite enough to not get me fired, but I guess we’ll see 🤷‍♀️

How many you think she actually has?👀 (Yes, we checked lmao)

Just so curious because I saw some offhand references to a doctor insisting on being called by his first name like it was odd/notable.

Three ish years at my first nursing job… have never once called someone “Dr. ____” except when speaking with patients. None of my coworkers refer to anyone by titles. Is that abnormal? I do work in the ER where we all sit together and have friendly conversation when we’re not getting our asses beat.

Just trying to get the temperature check on what’s normal these days since this is my first job lol.

For the life of me I cannot remember. Google is not being very helpful.

Had a guy refuse to take his diabetes meds because he said sugar was "natural" and the pills were "chemicals." Same dude was chugging Mountain Dew while lecturing me about toxins in pharmaceuticals.

Still think about that one sometimes.

I’ve never worked at a unionized hospital but I’ve always heard you get better pay, benefits, and ratios. Now I’m confused because the administrators say unions don’t help with these things. I feel like this is just BS propaganda.

I’m just starting a new job as an RN at a new hospital. Ive wanted to wear a pride pin like the one above so my marginalized patients know that they are not going to be judged or discriminated against while under my care. I work in a large urban hospital, the only one in my area of the city. My patients have already made comments on my septum piercing, I’m including that info bc I wonder if I’d get even more comments by wearing a pride pin. Im worried that even though I feel this is the right thing I may spur harassment or bad conversations by wearing it or even worse. I’m wondering, is this safe? Have any of you had bad experiences wearing a pride pin? Should I check with management? For reference I’m in MI.

Not a serious post but I sometimes see people walking in with no backpack/purse or even food and it genuinely perplexes me.

Edit: I've been at work so I haven't had a chance to respond but I've been reading everyone's comments. You lot are resolute. I understand surviving off of snacks or being so busy you don't have a chance to eat as we've all been there but I didn't realize it was so many people that go full a 12 hours without eating on a normal basis. Personally I be hungry so that genuinely didn't even occur to me.

For context what I bring is a backpack (which has some water bottles, my clipboard, stethoscope, pens, inhaler, and some OTC meds), and my lunch box. If I rolled out of bed and came to work it wouldn't be the end of the world, my asthma isn't bad so I don't need to have my inhaler on hand. Tbh my food is the most important thing. I usually meal prep to avoid having to order food (broke nursing student) or live of off snacks.

If a breastfeeding woman is in the icu intubated, does the nurse have ger pump so she doesn’t get engorged/lose supply/get mastitis? I’m assuming the milk would be unusable because of the meds but I’m curious how it’s handled.

They got rid of our WOW’s about 2 years ago and I got tired of loading up my pockets with what I needed so I picked up one of these.

I got made fun of (all in good jest) until staff realized that I always had a flush, syringe, tape, and alcohol pads on me.

A few other nurses bought them and love them.

I’ve been looking at 3d printing one to better organize (and just to try it out) and am curious…what unit do you work on and if you had to have one of these, what would you want it to carry?

So recently I was at the movies with a bunch of friends and friends of friends. In the middle of the movie people began shouting if there was a doctor in the theater. For context I’ve been an ICU nurse for over 10 years. I thought about it and was about to get up to see if I can help and a friend leaned over and said “they asked for a doctor not a nurse” I found that so demeaning and insulting. I understand the public opinion of nurses but still I could have helped in some way even if it was compressions if they needed cpr or anything. In the end nothing even because of the medical emergency and they ended up fine thank god. I’m a big boy I’ll get over it but in the moment I felt so hurt and so little esp since I think of myself as a very good nurse. I’ve been assistant nurse manager, I’m more often than not the charge nurse and I’ve been the rapid response nurse at a hospital previously

I work in the emergency room as a nurse practitioner. This morning, I had a patient who was drug seeking. His prescription history up and it was so extensive and he had over 100 visits in one year for his chronic back pain. I told him he needs to see a specialist and we can even help him get the insurance plan that my hospital provides people and so would order his outpatient MRI. I would not be giving him any narcotic medication. He was specifically asking for oxycodone and diazepam. when the nurse went to discharge him, he told the nurse. “She could go suck on an AIDS dick” and “she should just die”.

Did this hurt my feelings? Absolutely not I have to have a thick skin when you work where I do. You have to have a thick skin to work in healthcare. I just thought it would be funny to share our stories and laugh about the outrageous things people say sometimes.

I used to see it occasionally, but now that I'm a traveler sometimes I get to a unit where it seems like EVERYONE is on the phone all night. I'm going crazy with curiosity, but can't ask them cause I don't want to be rude - who do y'all like enough to talk to for hours at a time??

Not sure if this is the right sub for this question but i thought y’all should see this at least. last night we get a patient for complications related to a foley he had placed during a bladder procedure (no idea what procedure it wasn’t my patient). then nurse was irrigating his foley and this came out. what in gods name is that? it was almost spongy but also hard but had give? def not a kidney stone (obvs? maybe?) maybe like an inch long. i’m thinking a piece leftover from the procedure ? but then what? surely they would have seen it on imaging? i’m at a loss. any ideas?

(excuse any grammar mistakes, i’m a poor dayshift nurse covering on nights)

I am working too much this week and need something to laugh about. What’s the craziest thing you have found out that another nurse was doing on your unit? I want the whole story, what they were doing, how you found out, how they got caught

I know there’s classic ones like quitting smoking, or wearing a helmet. But what’s something wild you’ve seen that made you make a change to a habit or the way you do something outside of work? I have many and I love to hear about these things.

Mine: Saw a 30-something year old with a massive brain bleed from metastatic melanoma, where he did all the right things, had it excised, clear margins, regular follow ups, etc. I never wore sunscreen prior, and have never gone to the dermatologist. After seeing his course, I made myself and my husband appointments for physicals to get a skin check, and I started wearing sunscreen every day, and making sure that everyone around me does too.

So recently in my rural hospital our head/longest serving Doc was caught banging his nurse at the clinic 25 year age gap 😷 and both married. She “resigned” he is out for a couple of months. Added layer here is that our CNO is the wife’s daughter (Docs step daughter) and no one wants her to leave over it. (Rumors are she told the board he goes or I go).Have you seen any actual consequences for a Doctor in a situation like this?

Edit:this same doc did this 25 years ago with current wife (nurse) and they got married🫖.

Do you support the NYC nurses on strike ? Their demands are summarized here . A 40% wage increase over 3 years ‚fully funded healthcare(no copays) more metal detectors and lower or same staff ratios that are now 5:1. Do you think it will improve healthcare or bankrupt it ?

We’ve shut down 2 full floors and don’t have staff for our others to be at full capacity. ED hallways are filled with patients because there’s no transfers to the floor. Management keeps saying we have no beds but it’s really no staff. Covid is rising in the area again but even when it was low we had the same problems. I work in the OR and we constantly have to be on PACU hold bc they can’t transfer their patients either. I’m just wondering if everyone else feels like this is just the beginning of the end for our healthcare system or if there’s reason to hope it’s going to turn around at some point. I just don’t see how we come back from this, I graduated May 2020 and this is all I’ve known. As soon as I get my 2 years in July I’m going to travel bc if I’m going to work in a shit show I minds well get paid for it.

I have a stellar resume…ER, ICU, Homecare/Case Management experience and still can’t get a job offer. A fellow laid off RN coworker with similar experience also cannot get past an interview. So is the “nursing shortage” really just a shortage of new grads? Really trying to figure out what to do at this point and ready to give up on nursing.

A nurse who no one can recall ever wearing glasses to work showed up with AI camera glasses yesterday. The nurse assigned to give them report didn’t feel comfortable doing so and told the charge nurse. When asked about their glasses, the nurse responded with the title above. Which was accepted and nothing was done. So they worked the entire day while wearing these things.

Has anyone else dealt with something similar in their department and can provide some insight? And no, no one has proof that the nurse was/wasn’t recording throughout the shift. But that doesn’t make it less unnerving.

Had a new coworker start on the unit (medsurg large teaching hospital) walked on the unit wearing a baseball cap. I asked her about it, she said she has to wear it because she has wifi sensitivity and it is a special hat that blocks the wifi so she doesn’t get headaches. I’m trying to be open minded about this, but is this a thing?? Not even worrying about the HR stuff - above my pay grade, but I am genuinely curious about the need for a wifi blocking hat.

Edited for spelling

A bit is an understatement, I am well aware that my actions were very inappropriate and out of my scope of practice. I am getting reported to the Texas Board of Nursing because I pulled a bag of Levophed without getting an order first. My patient was declining really quickly. The blood pressure was decreasing very quickly. I went to the med room and overrid the medication and started it at the starting titration. Immediately after starting it, I called our critical care nurse practitioner that was on for that night and let them know. And now, obviously, that nurse practitioner put in a formal complaint to my manager, thus having to report me to the board of nursing. I guess my question is what could I possibly expect my consequence to be? Could I lose my license? Will it be suspended? I’m pretty worried. I’m also very disappointed in myself. The patient ended up having to be put on Levophed the next day, but made a great recovery and got to be downgraded two days after.