Popular but Unorthodox Drug Names

Levophed - Leave'em Dead: This is a vasocontrictor (tightens your blood vessels) and if overdosed, your extremities can necrose from no blood flow and lack of oxygen. It does its job very well. Use with caution!!

Milk of Amnesia: This is the slang for Diprivan (propofol). It is a milky white drug given IV that is used for sedation. It is VERY quickly metabolized so don't run out! By the time you get back from the drug room your patient will be waking up!

Vitamin A: This is for Ativan. Ativan is a wonderful anti-anxiety med that you give to your patients who are a pain in your neck and freaking out. Everything is better when everyone is calm.

MONA: This one is real: Morphine, Oxygen, Nitroglycerin, and Aspirin. This is the acronym for what the first line treatment for heart attack is.

Other interesting euphemisms....

Code Brown: This code occurs precisely after you have given your patient a bath and changed the linens...Yes, they crap everywhere!! Code Brown! Damn why don't we have a rectal tube on this guy??!??

First Hard Day

I had my first challenging day in the ICU. My patient who was on 7 different IV's tried to die...all day long.

It was a constant day of running, no lunch till 3PM and then you look up and see that it is already 5PM. Crap I still had lots to do! I feel as though I kept it together but it was oh so messy. My charting has a ways to go before it is good and knowing what drug to push when and how fast is a distant dream I hope to attain one day.

And FYI, when the monitor takes the blood pressure and it comes back with "unable to assess" that isn't a malfunction, that means there is no measurable blood pressure.

All...Day...Long....

Keep'em Alive Till Seven O Five!!

Motorcycles!!

I went to watch my friend ride his bike at the Eagle's Canyon track in Slidell, TX. Both cars and bikes race there. The track is about 3 miles long and has elevation changes as well as left and right turns.

It was great fun and definitely whetted my appetite to gear up and ride the curves there at the track. My friend rides in Level 3 and his wife goes for a while and watches thru her fingers as he zips around the track. ( He had a bad wreck on a country road last year) It looks like great fun! I am shooting for next year as a place to live is first priority. There were all kinds of bikes there, all fast of course, but I did see another Duc like mine in the beginner class. Lo and behold a woman was riding it too!

The track will wait for a while, but it is very close to the top of the list!! It looks like too much fun to avoid for very long!

House Hunting...

I have officially started house hunting. I am approved for a mortgage and am looking for a new residence. I have found some interesting places and am researching on in particular at the moment. All the ones I have looked at will need a little TLC, but I am good at the fixit thing and I like doing it.

Wish me luck in my searching!! It is kinda scary, but I think it will be just great in the long run.
You gotta live somewhere!

Shift Two on the Neuro-ICU Floor

In a nut shell:

• Busy as hell
• People ventilated
• More drugs than you ever imagined
  
• Keeping some people alive who should be happily dying at home

I know it's blunt and I know it is painful beyond words, but if I get to be 90+ and am in the ICU, will some one please unplug me.

'Cause I will be done by then.

What You Never Think About Missing

I am sure that all of us, at one time or another, have thought about what it will be like when our parents age and, inevitably, when they are no longer with us. I know I have.

What I did not think about was how it would be if my mom was here...but not. I never thought about what it would be like for her to be here, her body, her form, and yet she not be the same individual.
This is currently the case. The person who raised me is no longer present, only someone who looks like her and has some of her memories, although less and less with each passing day.

What I never thought about missing...
I miss having parents.

What Your Gut Tells you

After two weeks of ICU related classes, I have come to the conclusion that your nursing skills are indeed important, but what really is a necessity to the nurse is intuition. I have been told story after story of how that inner voice made the difference.

Learning to trust the inner voice is what separates nurses from the great nurses, as so I have been told. Another attribute required is a mouth and the comfort using it. Check, I think I have that one already. I'd rather be wrong and learn something and have my patient be OK than to be right, keep my mouth shut out of fear, and have someone's health decline or worse. Fear is so debilitating, but I diverge...

Trusting that "feeling" and developing that ability to listen from within when all hell is breaking loose is as essential as mastering the skills I have to learn not to mention the labs, assessment and the personalities of the Docs. In the last couple years I have had severe lessons in learning to deal with people, especially people who present one persona and yet are something completely different. Hopefully, this past experience will help with dealing with all the people I have to deal with. My hope is that all my martial arts will help me listen "on the inside" as well as keep it together when the fecal material hits the rotary machine.

I'll keep you posted on how things go. Now that I have a license, I want to keep it.

The Wait is Over!

It's official!!

There is an RN behind my name!!!

WooHoo!!

Please Excuse my Nausea!

This morning I took my NCLEX; or my state board exam for my Registered Nurse license.
I am so glad that is over!!

The test is a computer adaptive test, meaning it gets harder as you answer questions correctly. The minimum number is 75 and the maximum number is 265. My test stopped at 75 and my questions became really difficult. I hope this is a good sign. I will know for sure if I have an RN after my name or if I did really poorly by Monday.

Wish me luck, I have wanted to hurl all morning!!

Two Weeks Down

I just finished my second week at my new job and am having lots of fun! I have started the ICU specific classes as of Friday.
The difference when your instruction comes from someone doing what they are teaching is incredible. The instructors have great stories to help your brain hang the information on. Everything is interesting and memorable. Obviously there is the thought of needing this one day to keep someone from dying. I guess that is incentive as well!

My first time of 3-12s in a row is this next weekend; Saturday, Sunday, Monday. I am looking forward to being on the floor!

Motorcycles

I have acquired my next bike; a 2003 Ducati Monster 800. I am in love. It is, drum roll please, SHORTER than my last bike by about 3 inches (who would have thought three inches would be so amazing...but I diverge), it is my favorite motorcycle color, bright bumble bee yellow, and it is so well balanced it is a breeze to ride! I am already trying to throw it through corners. It had very low miles on it as well. I took it at the shop for a 6K mile tune up and to take it apart to look it over in detail. The sale "vet-check" had already went well. There are a few things I want to change, but overall, I am thrilled. I got a nice lesson in motorcycle maintenance and repair today when I went up to the shop to see how things were doing. Very cool!
Things I want to personalize:

• Clutch slave cylinder
• Handle bar risers
• New tail light package
• New grips (Done already - thanks Johnathon!)
• Find a manual

I cannot wait to take it to the track!!

Genotype Matters Not!

I can't believe I am actually going to say that President GeeDubya did something good; but here goes.
The president signed into law legislation protecting those with imperfect genes from discrimination.
GINA (Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act,) protects those people who utilize genetic testing to ascertain if they have certain genetic abnormalities. This law protects those individuals from insurance companies denying these people coverage.

I don't think the law protects these people from price-gouging, but I guess it is a start....
However, the law does protect people from premium increases or different premiums based on the genetic info people voluntarily find out.

Genetics and scientific advances in general pose so many ethical and financial questions for our society to grapple with now and in the future. These will be difficult questions to answer and no doubt we will answer lots of them wrong initially.
We just gotta keep learning...
Just because we can, does not always mean we should.

Quote of the Day

"Life need not be easy, provided only that it is not empty." Lise Meitner

Quote of the Day

You'll never leave where you are till you decide where you wanna be

Forward is the best direction….

We have a saying in nursing; If you mess up, fess up. I have applied this to my everyday life over the course of my nursing instruction. It illustrates the obvious; really, what good is any experience in life, unless you learn from it? The most egregious errors one makes with the most painful of results are always the most instructive if one only faces them and learns from said error. Pain is an excellent teacher. I am old enough to know that nothing nor any person is perfect. Perfection is a direction one strives for, knowing its possession is always out of grasp.

With mistakes, whether they are in work, person relationships, balancing your checkbook or whatever, growth as a person can come from any error. “Failing is just an opportunity to learn,” a quote often used and perfectly stated. But what of the people whom continue to make the same mistakes, choosing the same behavior repeatedly, regardless the outcome? Of the truly painful errors on my part, I will never repeat again, having learned volumes and having said errors define my person – for the better in my opinion. What makes others continue along that same erroneous path? Why not ask “Why” something happened instead of just plodding along, thinking, “Well, I’m gonna do that again, done it before…I’m sure it is still a bad idea…”

Mistakes are an opportunity to look really long and hard in the mirror and grow. Is growth really so frightening? Painful, without doubt, but I’d rather learn about the fire once, than get repeatedly burned.

So as I enter my life as a nurse and continue life personally my mantra is stead fast: if you mess up, fess up!! I just get to learn something new…

New Direction

I am so very glad that I am a Graduate Nurse! I have to take the boards and then survive the internship that is my new job. I still have lots of hurdles to cover, but I am re-fueling to be able to handle all of that.

One of the great things will be going back to my martial arts. Many interesting things await, I am sure, as you always miss out when you are not there. At any rate, I look forward to teaching and sweating, kicking and punching once again. Oh, and the stretching!!

Maybe an element of schedule can return to life.

It's Official!

I have officially graduated nursing school! Graduation is Thursday and I am so excited that it is over! I have many more hurdles to clear, but I think I can get that done. Yippee!!

Shopping in Earnest

I have officially sold Moose. I delivered him to his new home last night! WooHoo!

The shopping for something different now will be in full swing. I am going to get my final done first, but then I will be shopping to buy.
The list has changed somewhat:
2002-2006 Ducati Monster (620 or 800)
same year of Suzuki SV650

So far, that is what I am mostly interested in. I am just happy to have found a home for Moose! I am sure she will really enjoy learning on him. At 5'10" Moose's height is no issue for her!

When the Past Creeps in...

I have one more test before nursing school is officially over.
I also have a ridiculous terror of failing it.

It is so irritating when, your normal, confident, "I know I am on the right path," mind set can be unhinged by some stupid bad juju from your childhood.

I have this fear that I will have come this close and have worked this hard, and I will screw it up at the last moment. Man, am I the only weirdo out there?

My logical brain totally gets that this is not going to happen, because I will do all the things I must to be prepared and do well. This brain also knows that failure is not an option, so stop worrying with it.

Then there is the part that stills hears my dad screaming, "You don't have the sense god gave a goose! You'll never amount to anything!!" Thanks dad.

Throughout my life, I believe facing things and dealing with it up front is the only way to go. I believe that as of late now more than ever. Therefore, I thought I would blog for everyone's enjoyment of my state of agitated sympathetic neural response.
Yep, heart rate's up, blood pressure is up, fight or flight is in full gear....
Oh, that is on the next test.....

Food Rationing in the US

A friend alerted me to this article about Food Rationing in the US. With the globe being smitten with a food shortage, retailers are rationing food here to help meet demands elsewhere in the world. So much of our grain stores are being used for "PC" things such as bio-fuels, we are not feeding our body's engine but the engine of our cars. The inefficiency of bio-fuels, we can discuss later. Other crops are at risk as well; wheat did not do well at all last year and prognosis for this year is a little scary what with the weather forecasts.

As a nation, the US has to start putting needs of our planet and our societies at a higher priority than "me, me, me." The US consumes large amounts of resources in comparison to the rest of the planet. At some point, we have to stop.

Where does the overwhelming need to consume come from?
Do our kids really need that many toys?
How is it that having a so much "stuff" has come to replace enjoying life?

I was talking with a nursing student friend about when he and his wife and family of 4 kids were in Virginia for the summer. He said, "We brought clothes and something to drive. That was it, no stuff or nick-knacks. It was so much better." He and I both agree, less is more in so many ways.
De-clutter, remove the things in your life that are causing you strife and practice KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid).
The kissing part can be great too!.