3 semesters down, ONE to go!

The end of Adult health 2 already? I’ll be honest, at first this program felt long- like I would never get to the end, but now I’m so close I can feel that diploma in my hand.  A week and 1/2 left of Adult health, 7 weeks of Public Health, then 7 weeks of transitions. ONE. SEMESTER. LEFT.

Adult Health has really sparked my interest – more than any other clinical I’ve had (no, really this time!).  The unit that I’m on is “smart nursing”.  I have to know not only my diagnosis, but also my labs, my medication backgrounds – including some microbiology, and have good patient rapport- I love it.  It keeps me on my toes, keeps me thinking, not only for myself but for the patient.

I was lucky enough to get a day in the ICU where I witnessed and took care of two people that passed away.  It was an amazing experience, both the patients in question were DNR and the families were all in agreement about their loved one. I’ll tell you one thing – it’s not like Grey’s Anatomy or Scrubs. It’s not the docs that take care of everything postmortem, it’s us. It really gave me a chance to see a different side of nursing, and frankly I even surprised myself.  I handled what was happening with calm, and didn’t lose it when the family came to say goodbye, although I was told that was perfectly OK to do.

For my Public Health clinical I will be caring for patient’s at a domestic women’s shelter – I’m really excited to see a community aspect of nursing, away from the clinical setting. I have some friends that are going to Haiti and St. Vincent’s for their public health clinical – hopefully I’ll get some guest blogs going so you can hear about other experiences.

Have a great week!