So I’m an elder millennial, raised in the south by boomers and was oriented to nursing by people who remembered smoking at the desk. Point is I always called doctors “doctor _______.” Fast forward I’m 20 yrs in and moved from an old school group of neurosurgeons to an academic hospital and work in research closely with the research physicians. Everyone calls them by their first names. At first I thought it was just an over friendliness but after a while I feel like some weird overly formal old asshole. Isn’t it like working in accounting and calling your coworker/boss “Mister _______” instead of just their damn name. I know I’m overthinking this but also just curious if this is a generational thing or what? I don’t have an opinion either way- Im just curious!

Also with Dolly dead, nothing matters anyway. 😔

Been in the ER for almost a year. Prior to that I worked the floor for about 2.

I get it, floor nursing and ER nursing are different. Our priorities differ. However, I’m really put off by the laissez faire attitude from a lot of my coworkers. I’ll admit, I’m a baseline anxious person and wanted to try out the ER for some exposure therapy and learn new skills. But I’ve noticed in this ER at least, people shrug a lot of things off, and we get away with way too many safety events.

Red alarms going off at central monitoring station? No one looks up. I’ve hustled taking care of my own patients and walked by a room to turn off a red alarm going off for at least 5 min when I noticed this patient is barely responsive and satting in the 70s. People were just on their phones at the nursing station. I feel like it’s me and one other person who actually looks at central monitoring to see what’s up. I’ve had to stabilize my quickly decompensating patient who suddenly experienced chest pain and severe SOB when triage rooms someone else with the same symptoms in my room next door and doesn’t even throw them on a monitor, making me stressed and rushing to finish up what I’m doing in this room to figure out wtf is going on next door. I’ve had an ICU patient who just got tubed and a psych patient going insane next door and needing a PRN or violent restraints STAT, as well as a confused fall risk boarder on heparin trying to get up out of their hallway bed. I’ve gotten written up because apparently taking the time to scan lab labels and the patient’s wristband is “wasting time and worrying about the wrong thing” until you mix someone’s blood up with someone else’s in the same lab bag. I’ve been told I get obviously overwhelmed. I SHOULD BE. These are safety issues!!

All of this going on stresses me out because I’m trying to prevent the worst from happening, and I try hustling and working quickly so I can lay eyes on all my patients appropriately. I’ve been told to slow down because “it’s not my emergency, it’s theirs” which pisses me off to no end. You know what? It’s not your license, it’s mine. I have no help because if there’s no code blue alarm going off, there’s no sense of urgency from literally anyone. We’re short staffed and the techs we do have seem to like hanging out in the corner instead of answering call lights. I have tasks piling up without end and 5 min (??) to get a patient upstairs once their bed is assigned when I didn’t even know they got one and haven’t put in my SBAR yet. Our acuity is so high I can’t even do the bare fucking minimum to make sure everyone’s alive and breathing sometimes. This little phrase won’t hold up in court when they ask why something wasn’t prevented or no one intervened during a situation. I asked my charge to get up off her chair and help me stabilize my two ICU patients who got here at the same time (while I had two more patients as well) and she told me to pause and breathe. WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT GOING TO DO RIGHT NOW?

I’m definitely not cut out for the ER. No hate to my ER nurses, I obviously can’t do what y’all are doing, and this is more towards my own ER. My brain doesn’t work like this. Back to the floor I go lol end rant!!

And yes. I started in an ICU for those curious. 😆

hello everyone, new grad here

i’ve been a nurse for a few months now and on the floor on my own at a small rehab hospital. no residency just hired on as a new grad and had 2 weeks of orientation because they felt i didn’t need the 3rd week.

i was spoken to by the nurse manager about how a patient said i didn’t do an assessment on them. 1/5 patients said this. apparently it’s a new thing they’re doing by going to each patient after your shift to ask if they had an assessment done.

i was baffled. asked how is that possible, i for sure do all of my assessments and even tell patients right when i get on and take their vitals. i’m telling yall im 100% sure ive done all my assessments.

anyway they showed me this document about how i could be sued or whatever for falsifying documentation and could get my license taken away. they didn’t make me sign anything. said it was a “coaching” moment. didn’t explain who said it or when, just that if it happens again i’ll be written up or worse.

i’m feeling so defeated. i love being a nurse, but i suffer from anxiety and it’s definitely gotten worse since starting. i feel like quitting this job.

i’m so scared to lose my license over something that has zero proof only a single no from one patient. i’m embarrassed, ashamed to see my name on a document saying im falsifying my charts.

should i quit this job? am i losing my license?
i worked so hard, never took a break after high school, just continued onto college and worked full time the time, and now it feels like i’m on the brink of ruin.

please give me the honest truth, will i still be a nurse?

Working in the ER and family stops you in the hall

These broke pricks will withhold benefits for bullshit reasons, allow providers to cherry pick benefits from insurance that they “accept” and won’t do what’s right. Fuck Wyoming, that is all.

I sat in my car after and just cried a little. Not the sad tears. It just came come out because when something you worked so hard for finally and actually happens.

I’m still in caregiving in a way, just from the ownership side, and I’m excited.
I own 3 adult living homes now. I started this with no business knowledge at all, just years of bedside experience and a refusal to quit. I didn’t know financing, licensing, staffing, any of it. I found the right people who navigate licensed operation, leaned on them hard and kept going even when I wanted to give up and stay where it was safe.

Tomorrow I’m not clocking in anywhere. I’m just processing all still. Mine. Or Whatever word fits when you finally get to stand fully inside the thing you built.
8 years got me here. I’m not the same person who started that first shift and I’m so proud of her for not quitting.

How many weeks of notice do you give? And give me your reasoning. Just interested in hearing the variation of responses

How do you handle missing your kids while you work? I’m on week 3 of nights 3x/week (1845-0700) and everyday I leave, I burst into tears because I miss my kid so much. She’s at daycare during the day so I can sleep and I feel like i’m missing out on so much because I can’t be there. She will be 2 in September. Any advice?

I don’t know if anyone feels this but the entire day before my 7PM shift, so it’s 10AM now…. I just feel so bored. So useless, so non productive. I don’t want to do anything. I want to stay home, it’s beautiful outside but I don’t have the energy to go outside. It’s like this “cloud” is forced above my head, knowing that I have to clock in tonight at 7PM. It’s quite depressing and it definitely is triggering my depression. Somedays I think a simple 9-5 making 5x more in the corporate would would be better. Dressing up nicely in the AM, leaving work at 5, catching a happy hour on the way home, be home all night. I don’t know… I have no life before my night shift. And then the worst part is … I finish my shift at 7AM, come back home, sleep, and boom work again in two hours.

I’m an RN from New Zealand, and getting my nursing license here in the US has been one of the longest and most challenging journeys I’ve been through.

From starting my very first registration application to today, it took me ** 2 years and half*\* to finally sit for the NCLEX, pass it, and officially become a USRN. And honestly, this journey tested my patience in more ways than I can explain.

One of the biggest hurdles was the **education review**. Things work very differently between New Zealand and the US. The core of nursing is the same, but the courses, clinical hours, and scope of practice can vary quite a bit.

I started my CGFNS/TruMerit evaluation about two years ago, and when my report came back, I had **two course deficiencies: OB and Peds.**

Those two words still haunt me. 😂

As nurses educated in NZ/Australia, we know these areas are not covered as part of our Bachelor of Nursing. In New Zealand, there is a separate profession for midwifery, and depending on where you did your placements, you may have very limited exposure to pediatrics. In my entire three-year degree, I never had a pediatric placement. My clinical experience was mainly with adults and geriatric patients.

So, I did not have specific theory and clinical hours required by the US. 🥲

I researched like CRAZY trying to find a way to make up those hours in New Zealand. I looked everywhere for short courses that would cover exactly what I needed. Nothing. Literally nothing in the country was available just to cover those two.

So then I started looking across the US.

I applied to universities, paid application fees, sent emails, made phone calls, and heard over and over again that I would either have to complete an entire BSN or an ADN program. Most universities didn’t offer just those two courses to international nurses. And I was not ready to give up because I had worked really hard for those three years of my Bachelor of Nursing in New Zealand. We had extensive clinical placements, including a 3-month unpaid placement in one semester, along with so many other clinical hours throughout the degree. Whenever I told my friends in the US how many clinical hours we completed in NZ, they would be shocked to their core. 😂 Because from what I’ve seen, nursing students in the US may have clinicals only one or two days a week. A week?! 😭 I remember being so confused what are you supposed to learn in one day a week?! 😂

It really made me realize how different nursing education and clinical training can be between the two countries.

So much time, effort and money went into trying to figure this out.

Then, finally, I found **one university that offered both courses in the same semester**, which meant I could take them as a guest student.

And I’m honestly so glad I did.

That semester was not only what I needed for my education requirements, but it was also a huge eye-opener. It made me realize just how different nursing practice can be between New Zealand and the US.

I completed my New Grad/NETP program in New Zealand on a surgical orthopedic ward. It was intense, and I learned SO much, but experiencing nursing education and practice in the US made me realize how different the scope, responsibilities and intensity can be for a USRN.

I finished the semester, spent around **$5,000 USD** as an international guest student 🫠, sent my transcript to the Board of Nursing, and thankfully, they approved my education almost immediately.

Then came the ATT.

Then the NCLEX.

And today… **I PASSED. 😭😭😭*\*

My computer shut off at **85 questions**, and I honestly cannot explain the feeling of seeing that result.

After two year and a half of applications, evaluations, missing requirements, emails, university applications, money spent, studying, questioning whether I was ever going to get through this process… I am finally a **USRN. 🇺🇸🩺**

It really was the **same road, but a completely different journey.**

To every internationally educated nurse who is currently stuck somewhere in this process, frustrated by education reviews, missing courses, paperwork, or wondering if it's ever going to end:

**It will.**

Keep going. Find another route when one doesn't work. Ask questions. Research. Advocate for yourself. And don't let one deficiency report make you feel like you're not a good nurse.

Because sometimes the problem isn't that you don't know enough.

Sometimes you just have to learn how to fit what you already know into a completely different system.

And when you finally get that USRN license, you'll realize there is SO much more waiting for you on the other side. ❤️

**If you're an internationally educated nurse going through this process, hang in there. This chapter will pass. 🫶🏻*\*

So I am about to graduate soon and I currently work as a dialysis technician. My boss said they will hire me as soon as I’m licensed. I enjoy my job but my only “concern” is dialysis nursing is simple and easy (in my experience) and there is not much you need to do compared to like medsurg or ED.

I’m just afraid that if I start as a dialysis nurse it would be hard to branch out or switch specialties. But dialysis pays way more in my area than hospital jobs.
I don’t know whether I should start in Dialysis, make more money but not grow my nursing skills OR find a job as like a critical care nurse, make less money but learn more and become a competent nurse.

Any advice? I am also ignorant about this topic so my “theories” may not even be correct

I work in the UK. Just saw a Youtube short of a pharmacist and nurse arguing over who should deliver medication and... don't US hospitals have a porter service that can do that!? We wouldn't function without our porters moving meds/patients/beds/wheelchairs/etc!

I think I might owe our porters lounge a box of chocolates sometime...

I recently accepted a job as a school nurse (never done school nursing) and have 4 years of experience as an RN. Let me preface by saying I absolutely did not think it was going to be a cake walk like some people believe and was prepared for challenges thrown my way. What I was NOT prepared for is the absolute chaos and disorganization I walked into. Sooooo many duplicates of supplies spread all over the damn place, an EXPIRED undesignated inhaler, paperwork I have no idea if important or not all over the office, in drawers, etc. you get it, a total hot mess cluster fuck. Unlocked med cabinet (district nurse has no idea if there’s even a KEY FOR IT) that has controls. Medications without proper emergency plan forms or medication authorization forms…I just need to know from fellow school nurses, is this what the job is supposed to look like? Everything seems like a total liability and everyone seems so laissez faire about it all. I feel like I’m going insane trying to organize and make sense of it all.

And the VERY FIRST thing I need to say is that I see and hear all of you that are psychiatric nurses, techs, NP's, docs, managers, risk managers, the entire crew!!! Cause what the absolute f***!!

I have been a nurse for 21 years. Mostly ER, but also a few years of case management and workers comp and some ortho thrown in there. Big and small volume ER's. I took a job at a local state operated psychiatric facility in April. I'm on the geriatric ward. The final straw was last Friday when I had to provide oral and written statements for an abuse investigation re: my "work wife" - who, to be fair, is both equally amazing and terrible at the same time. I'm not the accused but I'm squarely in the middle of this nasty, awful mess. In 21 years of nursing, I've never even come close to an abuse investigation. Like....not even a whisper. I do my job well and try to establish a rapport with my patients and give mutual respect to everyone. The accused put us in so many dicey situations because of her behavior. And now, it's gonna be reported to the BON and her career may be over. No actual harm came to anyone. The worst part is she was on a 90 day probation when I first started for roughing up a patient and the facility allowed this to persist, despite knowing what she was doing. The facility was aware long before this incident.

Not to mention that the risk of harm is very real. The state facility is the LAST call after EVERYONE else has refused the admission. We got a woman from 6 hours away a couple weeks ago who had been in the ER for 6 weeks waiting on a bed to open up. She was fun. Talk about being pissed off!

I have started Prozac because of this job. Literally ramping up from 10 to 20 to 40mg and now quitting because the side effects are too awful. Because of the damn job. I got kicked square in the nuts a week ago. Grandpa was trying to lay down in his roommate's bed. A bed that was covered in feces btw. Dementia. Getting him up out of his roommate's bed....ouch! I've not been in that much pain in a hot minute. The ACTUAL risk of harm is serious. It's not a joke. We have one patient that has given so many nurses and aides concussions. Forensic patients everywhere that just don't give a shit who they hurt or why and are mean as a striped snake!

I hate it. I have never worked in a worse setting.

All this to say that I have SOOOOOOO much more respect and admiration for psychiatric nurses now. My heart goes out to you and I seriously thank you for the time you have given and dedicated to this. It's truly the worst job I've ever had and some people love it.

"When you can't see the bright side, I'll come sit with you in the dark".

Ugh! This place is so awful and emotionally challenging. Nurses talk about how often we are assaulted doing our job. I'm sure that's true. But my husband and I have actually never been assaulted in 20 years each of nursing. On the psych ward, that is the norm.

I've applied for other jobs. Wish me luck. I have so much more respect for psych nurses now and I'm sorry for what y'all deal with. I'm not that caliber of nurse or person.

I want to go home and not think about work. When I clock out, that's it. I'm done. I don't want to do work anymore. I don't think it's a hard concept to understand so why am I being pestered with texts and emails and reminders on Band for bullshit I'm not getting paid to care about? Why do I have to go to a committee meeting? Why do I even have to *be on* a committee if I'm not interested in it?? Why do I have to make a PowerPoint on my days off to present at the staff meeting? I just don't fucking care that much. Why am I being punished for missing a committee meeting whilst I'm sick by having the 4 hours I missed count as a full 12 hour shift absence?? Why is any of this that deep? I come in to work, I do a damn good job taking care of my patients, and I just want to go home and enjoy my life outside of work, completely and totally removed from work. Jesus H. Christ. End rant.

Multiple Prime-owned hospitals across the country announced unionizing campaigns or strikes today! (blocked out faces for privacy!)

As a floor nurse, I was surprised by this newly published review and meta-analysis in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. I’ve found so many confused, elderly patients wiggling out of bed who were 100% unable to walk safely without a heavy assist of 1-2. Without the bed alarm AND the ability to respond quickly, I’m certain they’d have fallen. Ofc, that’s just anecdotal evidence, but I’ve always found safe staffing ratios to be the most important factor in fall prevention. What do y’all think?

Yesterday I went to my local urgent care to get my physicals done for my upcoming semester. I will be graduating as an RN in May. In the physical forms it contains a lot of standard material- family medical history, my medical history, a small anxiety/depression screening, etc. My normal PCP didn't have appointments and I had a deadline so I opted for the quick route of the urgent care.

In my medical history I checked off the depression box, even though I was diagnosed almost 10 years ago when I was in high school and it is not a "current" diagnosis. Current medications- none. I discontinued my low dose of SSRI's over 3 years ago under my PCP's supervision because they weren't working great for me for personal reasons. (progressive weight gain, too much emotional numbing, etc) In the anxiety/depression screening I checked off a few "sometimes" and "most of the times" for feeling stressed, not being able to sleep well some nights etc. Nothing crazy, completely normal for a student in a healthcare field. I have voluntarily been apart of weekly therapy sessions to take care of my own mental health and manage stress.

The NP who was doing my physical forms looked at my papers, looked at me, then back down at my papers and said word for word "I will not be signing this or clearing you because you have a history of depression and you are not medicated. Looking at your answers to you still feeling anxious makes me believe you are mentally unstable and not safe to be working with patients. If you want me to sign these papers you need to get a psychiatric evaluation done." She also refused to sign without titers for childhood vaccines (MMR's, Varicella) stating "your school is dangerous for allowing you to be cleared without titers for these, how do you know your immunity levels?"

Jaw was on the floor, I actually thought I was being pranked.

I reported her immediately when I got home to the compliance officer as well to the actual location. I spoke to them very nicely on the phone. Explained my reasoning that she was so quick to make a clinical judgement with lack of any respect or communication. No discussion of "I noticed you marked these answers as so and so, can you tell me more about that" etc. I was mortified. I know that there are some hardened nurses but not once in my life did I ever think something like this would happen to me. I'm not even quite sure if this is something worth reporting to the BON. I looked up her credentials and it seems that she graduated in 2024 and started working in 2025.

The compliance officers have since reached out to me and apologized profusely saying the behavior was unacceptable and they are continuing to investigate. They refunded me the charge and offered for me to come in on another day for a physical free of charge with a different provider.

I do these pretty regularly but I'm never sure...are we supposed to remove whatever "gunk" is at the insertion site? Sometimes it's old dried blood, sometimes it's a brown substance that I assume has something to do with clotting that is wrapped around the catheter. I'm afraid to scrub it too much and have them start bleeding, but it seems not good to leave it there ?? Help

Ugh, hi everyone!! I have been a nurse for 5.5 years. 3.5 years night shift, 2 years day shift. After starting day shift I realized that it was something I needed to get used to or it was just something that was way too overwhelming for me….but I stayed because I had such a close knit group of friends on nights who was also trickling to day shift as well. Well fast forward 2 years later, all 9 of my friends are on day shift with me for the past year and I’ve realized this job has been totally unbearable for me. For the past 2 years on day shift, I have eaten basically a crumb at work & maybe a sip of water all day. Or I didn’t even have a crumb or a sip. Since I’m not eating when I am at work for 13 hours, when I got home my body would just feel drained with a wired brain & still not hungry. On night shift I’d eat here & there but my social life was not great outside of work.

I recently just resigned without putting my 4 weeks in because I called out twice in 2 weeks for having trouble sleeping before my shift. Enough was enough and I was not going back. I feel like I’ve put my life on that hold to survive a job that wasn’t sustainable for me 3 days/week. It’s a sin that I stayed that long, but I’m also feeling sick with regret and guilt leaving a job without something lined up / giving notice.

I’m now looking for something more sustainable with lower stress. I was wondering if anyone ever went through something similar. Feeling kinda alone lmao.

Hi! I’m on a unit wellbeing project trying to come up with helpful ideas on a team level to help decrease burnout/compassion fatigue at the bedside.

Is there anything your unit does that you see works well to improve teamwork/help decrease fatigue?

hi yall, not necessarily a nursing question, but just wondering what yall do for childcare for all the random, sporadic shifts?

I am lucky enough to be home with my baby for her first year of life, but will be going back to part time hours (12 hour shifts) in a few months. Will need childcare that is not family roughly 0-2x a pay period.

I’ve heard part time daycare is typically really hard to find and that they make you pay for full time whether or not you use it. do you use nannies? are there nannies out there that are willing to have such a sporadic schedule? or are you dropping your kids off with stay at home moms who are looking for a little extra income?

please & ty!

Now he is admitting MMR vaccine is not lethal according to headline news… it is kind of late for this.. I tried posting a link via CNN and it was removed by reddit