Travel nursing offers some amazing benefits and opportunities to those who decide that this is the right career path and lifestyle for them. The chance to see a variety of new places and sights and to experience a variety of local cultures is a wonderful motivator for medical professionals. Plus, there are opportunities to learn from new people with a variety of different experiences as they travel from assignment to assignment.
Continue reading “Travel Nursing and Personal Relationships”Shiftwork is something that nearly every healthcare professional has to deal with at some point in their career. Just when you get used to working a certain shift, it’s time to switch up and change over to another. This can wreak havoc on your personal schedule and internal clock, making it hard to cope both physically and mentally. Shift work can also take a toll on your family, as their schedule is disrupted by your altered availability, varied meal and sleep times, and more. How do you handle this necessary evil with the least disruption? Here are a few tips that can help with shift transitions: Continue reading “Tips for Handling Shift Transitions”
No one wants to feel like nothing more than an ID number on a file or a time-slot in a daily schedule. As a care provider, it is up to you to develop healthy relationships with your patients in order to give them the best quality care possible. Outcomes are often improved when there is a solid, trusting relationship between doctor and patient, so it’s worth your time to work to develop these connections. Here are a few important points to keep in mind as you work with your patients each day.
Continue reading “Maintaining Healthy Patient-Provider Relationships”
When a patient initially comes in for care, their end-goal is to be free from whatever illness or injury is plaguing them. Though this can be the case after a period of treatment, sometimes even the simplest illnesses require more intervention than expected. Patients can become frustrated when they aren’t seeing progress in their treatment, and they may begin to question doctor’s orders and treatments. Communication can help to manage these expectations and create an environment that allows for discussion and change of direction, as well as a better understanding of possible outcomes.
Continue reading “Managing Patient Expectations”A few weeks ago, there was a story all over the news and social media, featuring a video of a nurse being taken into custody after refusing to allow blood to be drawn from an unconscious patient. In the video, a police officer was demanding that he be allowed to draw blood from the patient who was under her care, though he had no warrant to override direct consent from the patient, which he was unable to give. The officer became irate at her refusal, though she explained that it was her job to protect the rights of her patient, and placed her in handcuffs.
In the end, the nurse came out as the hero, and there was an investigation of the officer who was wrongfully asking for the blood sample and wrongfully placed her into custody. It was a dramatic scenario and quite frightening to any medical professional who cares about their patients, even though the final outcome was positive.
At some hospitals, this has caused serious discussion about the place of nurses and other care providers in being the point of contact with the police. Changes are being made at some facilities to remove those directly responsible for patient care from the equation so they are no longer required to interact with the police. If your facility is not one of these, it is important to know how to protect yourself and your patients in similar scenarios. Continue reading “Protecting Yourself while Protecting Your Patients”
When patients are diagnosed with a condition that requires extensive or long-term treatment, going the “take two of these and call me in the morning” route might seem the simplest way to go, but it can be detrimental to their personal outcome. Patient education is a very important part of the diagnostic and treatment process that should not be overlooked or glazed over. In fact, some hospitals and practices employ patient educators whose specific job it is to work with patients to improve their understanding. Those who have a better understanding of their condition, how it can affect them, things they can do to improve their own outcome, and the why and how of their diagnosis and prognosis are better patients and will have a better outcome and outlook as they go through treatment.
Continue reading “Educating Patients is as Important as Medicine”