NurseTalk NZ » skills

The whole shebang

Newbie NP — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 15:29:07 +0000

I have just attended an excellent conference including a presentation on performing pelvic exams on challenging patients. Which begs the question- why do “non-medical smear-takers” aka nurses NOT get taught to do bi-manual pelvic exams with their smeartaking? It is like teaching phlebotomy without teaching how to actually draw the blood.

Can anyone tell me why this is so?

Every smeartaker should be able to complete the second phase of a smear- the bi-manual exam. It is not rocket science. It is a technique like many others nurses do- invasive- yes but you are already down there anyway! But not dangerous.

Makes me wonder who designed the original smeartakers courses in the first place?

what’s in a day?….

Newbie NP — Thu, 13 May 2010 09:16:24 +0000

I always have an uncomfortable niggle at the thought of “Nurses Day”. I get the same feeling when I consider the “special” nurses conference day that the GPCME conference offers. Its a “pat on the head and be good/silent for the rest of the year” kind of niggle. And I see that I am not alone. Head Nurse has some issues and would rather have nurses recognised adequately and respectfully for what we really do-

“We’re not just warm and fuzzy: we’re scientists, we’re social workers, we’re personal counsellors If we can give the people we talk to about nursing a complete picture of what it is we do–rather than focusing on things like nurses eating their young, or crappy doctors, or how fulfilling it is to wash a back at three a.m.–we’re likely to find many more smart, motivated people who are suddenly interested in becoming nurses..”

Health Leaders Media journalist Rebecca Hendren asks why nurses should get a day when so few others, including doctors, get the same special recognition. One of the doctors I know suggested facetiously that docs get the other 364 days to be special! Wouldn’t it be nice, they say, if we didnt need nurses week to celebrate how nurses actually contribute to the health of nations.

The nursing advocacy website suggets a T-shirt slogan : “My physician colleagues got 99% of the funding for research and residencies, and all I got was this Nurses Week T-shirt!”

But seeing as how we still have it for now- lets use it for the greater good and blow our own trumpet positively, respectfully and intelligently!

Nurses do not “pop”

admin — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 09:53:51 +0000

Apparently health chiefs in an Auckland (NZ) hospital are reviewing their safety record as part of their continuing quality improvement plans. I wasn’t going to bring this to the blog but then I spied the last paragraph: The hospital has been running a pilot to reduce falls……“Nurses popping in every hour to have a chat and see if patients have any needs seems to be a good way to stop falls,” reports the clinical director of QI. In the four weeks prior to the pilot scheme, there were 15 falls in wards. Four weeks after the pilot, there was only one. (Wonder what didn’t get done whilst the nurses were”popping in”?

Excuse me, but care assistants may “pop in”, tea ladies may “pop in”, but nurses do planned assessments of their patients state of health whenever they see them. This is a clear case of poor use of language that continues to perpetuate the dumbing down of nursing. It brings to mind the 1997 British Columnia Nurses Union campaign:

“He thinks he’s having a conversation about the hospital Jell-O. She’s actually midway through about 100 assessments. In the seconds it takes to reach the bedside, a Registered Nurse will have made over 100 assessments. Any one of which could mean the difference between recovery and tragedy. Take away direct patient care from Registered Nurses and vital knowledge affecting the health of the patient is lost. Nurses are doing vital work. It’s that simple…..”