Life as a Nurse

If you didn't know, I'm actually a Registered Nurse by day. It's what I do for a living. My background is Emergency Medicine (my home) and Interventional Radiology (my second home). I did ER for 3 years and IR for 2 yrs & 7 months and now I am back to the ER again... Hustlin'... while still helping out IR too (the goal is to do half & half. Why? Because I like the variety of things).

Well yesterday, I took care of a patient with severe Parkinson's. He was there overnight (carried on from night shift) and pretty much needed a new placement for his on going care. His brother, who was his primary caretaker, was there too at bedside the whole time. After a little chit-chat, I found out that the brother isn't able to take care of the patient anymore due to his severe stage of the disease (if you are not familiar with Parkinson's, see Michael J. Fox... but this man right here was worse thatn MJ Fox). The brother was in the verge of losing his job & he even sacrificed his own medical conditions in order to take care of his brother *tears*. You can tell that he loves his brother so so much.

So Mr. Patient here has occasional delusions, he tends to get out of the bed no matter how we repositioned and staged his hospital gurney to prevent him of getting out and fall (he has history of falling due to his shakes). As I get to know him more during the day, it's not delusion. It's just his way of communicating is very difficult because of his Parkinson's. He has a hard time trying to blurt out words to express himself to the point he gets really frustrated. I felt really bad for him.

Meanwhile, my friend from Case Management took the time, out of her busy list of patients, to work on a new placement for this gentleman. She literally spent 1/2 of the day trying to get this man a new place. I owe her a beer, or two.

At one point during the day, the brother had to step out to make a phone call, so I decided to act as a sitter for Mr. Patient. As I try to reorient him and get him comfortable, the chitchatter in me decided to be friendly nosy. I started asking about his martial status (unmarried), his siblings (his brother & deceased sister), his ethnical background (South America), teasing about how his birthday is just 1 month away from mine ("But I am 30 years older than you, mija" he says) and where he used to live prior to being in California... You know, just trying to be personal with him. All the meantime, feeding him and giving him some Apple Juice and working our way together with our communication skills with his Parkinson's. I was being a ProActive listener.

So my Case Manager friend was able to find him a new place to stay and boy his brother was very delightful. They got him in right away as a direct admission. They were happy, we were happy, everyone was happy. The brother gave me a hug of joy.

After finishing their paperwork and discharging him out, I wheeled the patient to his car with his brother. Then Mr. Patient, with his shaky body, stood up & turned around slowly... And insisting to give me a hug, a big hug. With his Parkinson's talk, he said "Thank You for all of your help".

And that made me feel great for being a nurse.

Sometimes, you just have to stop and listen. Some of my coworkers who weren't in my area that day asked, "What's wrong with your patient? Is he drunk? Is he on drugs? Why does he shake a lot?" Us nurses, especially Emergency/ICU RNs, we have to desensitize ourselves from many difficult situation, so it's pretty common to see nurses being subjective with our own thinking, especially when it's based on a quick glance on a situation (we, nurses, are on the go). Sometimes, because of busy load of work, we tend to "forget" that we are dealing with humans who have emotions. AND, sometimes, patients & family members also FORGET that they too are dealing with humans. We are humans too, us nurses & doctors. We have emotions and feelings too.

Just like Ellen DeGeneres says all the time, "Be Kind to One Another"... If we only take some time to just listen wholeheartedly, not only you changed that other person's life, it changes yours too.

I hope Mr. Patient is doing okay today.

- Rima

linking up with Treasure Tromp :)

I'm Going Back to the Start...

(cue "The Scientist" by Coldplay)

First of all, since it's the first week of October, Happy ER Nurse's Week.

Anyways, some of you may not know that my background of nursing is actually Emergency Medicine. I was in the ER for 3 years before I transferred my ass to Interventional Radiology aka IR aka Medical Imaging aka "Er, what kind of nursing is that?!!!?!" says everyone that asked. My 2+ years in IR were splendid... From doing crazy emergency cases (Man vs Cow. May he RIP) to getting awesome lunches from Reps (from BJ's to Panera to Famous Dave's). We are a tight-knit family (6 Nurses, 4 Radiology Technologist & 4 IR Doctors), so it's always a love-hate situation everyday at work. My Monday-Friday, with holidays and weekends off (except when being on-call) are awesome. We work closely with the other division of the Medical Imaging department and we all watch each other's back.

Yet this awesomeness that I have experienced will come to an end :( It's like closing a chapter.

I am going back to my roots. I will be serving back as an Emergency Nurse in November (cue the bedpans & butt cleaning. #argh). Why? Because of baking school. I can have a flexible schedule (I make my own schedule) while I'm learning something that is the opposite of nursing, baking (I can get your sugar high... better bring your insulin! #harharhar)

I will miss working with my IR team. A lot. Gonna miss the free lunches (duh free food). But it is nice to go back and work with some of my old co-workers and doctors... and get my old skills back in order. Plus, no call :)

Good thing IR is right next door to the ER.

I guess you can't have everything. I would love to stay in IR, but I can't have a flexible schedule.

Oh life.

- Rima

Playing Nurse

So today I would like to share with y'all my experience with this patient of mine that I dealt with today.

Let's call her Ms. Awesome (why awesome? It was her attitude. You'll see why). She was my 2nd patient of the day and the procedure that we had to do for her was an axilla biopsy. When I saw her this morning, I totally remembered her because I was her nurse when we did her breast biopsy. Prior to seeing her again, I looked up her medical records and read the results of the breast biopsy. I frowned. Not good. She's positive for breast cancer. A pretty invasive and aggressive one too :(

Anyways, when I walked in and saw her face, I totally remembered her and said, "Hey, I remember you!" She was like, "Yeah you were my nurse last time!" I go on and explained the procedure to her and did some Q & As for her. She had this really upbeat and this I-am-Not-Scared-of-this-Shit attitude regarding her recent diagnosis. She was very positive and is ON it regarding her care and appointments.  She told me, "Girl, I'm ready for this. I'm 50 years old, I'm still young. I can fight this."

Then I was just being a big mouth (I like to talk to my patients... In a way, it's my version of stress control for them aka distraction) and told her that I'm doing a Susan G Komen Race for the Cure 5K, and her response really got me. Made me more proud of what I do as a nurse. 

She said (even though it's pretty simple), "Rima, thank you. Thanks for doing that. What you're doing is pretty awesome. Thank You."

I was stunned. Her simple answer made my day. 

For a moment, I was so grateful for the profession that I'm doing. This is why I'm a nurse. To make a difference in a person's life... even though, in her case, I'm doing it indirectly to her... More for her disease process.

After the whole biopsy, after giving her discharge instructions and signing papers, I walked her out to the lobby. She said, "Thanks for making that whole process as painless as possible and making me feel very comfortable. And girl, even though you're gonna walk that race, I really appreciate what you're doing for the cancer!"  

Right there... is the reason why I'm a nurse. 

So Ms. Awesome, I'm dedicating my 5K race for you too. You and that Ms. Big Brave Heart.

Let's fight this evil disease.

If you like to donate for this cause (It's tax deductible) click here. I'm doing the 5K with the Pillow (yay) and his work company. 

Nursing Link - Up

Browsing around after finishing my Church Bulletin (love doing it but it's a drag), I found 2 bloggers, who are both Nurses (YAY!) and they have a link up specifically for us nurses (and student nurses too). This is rad. Super rad. I love Nursing. I love finding Nursing Bloggers. Holla. You know it. 
So for this entry, the topic of the link-up is the Dress Code. Oh dear. First off, my dress code is BOH-RING. Since the mandatory switch-a-roo (which rumor has it, it's gonna be eliminated) for my department (Inteventional Radiology), I have to use the OR scrubs. It's not like the fun green ones above, it's the nasty PJ like, ugly dead sky blue. It's so boring. I look really weird in it. The size are never true to the label (an S can be an M, vice versa), and I always look like I'm drowning in scrubs. The only way to spice it up is with fun shoes and a surgical cap. And my big glasses. Hah.

Most of my other regular scrubs are from a variety of brands, Koi to Dickies to UA. For shoes, I prefer my Crocs clogs or this fine hot pink ones that I got from Goodwill. 

Other accessories are my Badge holder (currently a blinged-up Green Bay Packers) and my Baby-G watch in Teal. Oh and some fun hair ties. Haha. Oh and can't forget pens. Lots of them. Especially since my IR docs like to jack up my pens. I even had one of them swear to me to bring me some cute Korean pens while he's over there. 

I would love to see other nurses on what they wear. Gotta love nursing.

For non-nurse readers, sorry. haha... gotta spread the love.

moonbeamers,