“In today’s episode we talk not only with an empowered registered nurse- we visit with a distinguished lawyer. And get this… what type of law does she practice? Why, she helps nurses with practice and license issues! Talk about giving back to the nursing profession.” [Listen to Interview]
When Life Hands You Lemons
Have you ever felt that when something so unexpectedly happens, it’s like you’ve been kicked in the gut? This is how a lot of my nurses and other health care providers feel when they are terminated from their position or get a complaint before the Licensing Board. They are good practitioners, but then out of the blue something happens.
When this happens, take responsibility. I’m not saying that you necessarily should admit the incident is your fault, but to take responsibility from the standpoint of “this happened and now I can do something about it.”
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Mistakes In Nursing
We all know that it is impossible to go through life without making a mistake. Yet mistakes have such a negative connotation and, unfortunately, in the nursing profession some mistakes have serious consequences.
I think we should see mistakes as learning opportunities. It took Thomas Edison over 1,000 tries to make the light bulb. When he was asked why you continued after failing over 1,000 time, he said “I learned over 1,000 ways how not to make a light bulb.” I love his reframe. In the nature of being human, mistakes can and do happen. However, the most important thing is what we can learn from the mistake and then move forward from the error. One aspect of learning from a mistake is determining how to prevent it from happening again.
It’s license renewal time in Indiana and all nurses must disclose whether they were terminated or reprimanded in their capacity as a registered nurse. Many nurses made an innocent mistake that resulted in reprimand or even termination.
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Are You Following Your Hospital’s Policies?
Do you know your hospital’s policies and procedures? Do you follow them?
If you have worked at numerous places, you probably have noticed that each hospital has its own specific policies and procedures. It may never occur to you to look up the policy or procedure on something because, as the saying goes, “We’ve always done it this way.”
But, be careful!
There are variations in the policies and procedures of facilities. At one facility you might draw blood from a central line but find that if you then go to another facility and assume that you could draw blood from a central line, you may want to think again. Or at least check the facility’s policies and procedures to be sure.
Should you be practicing outside the scope of your practice, that is a violation of the Nurse Practice Act. The policies and procedures will save you every time!
Let’s say you work in a facility where a physician normally orders a certain medication for post-op pain and the orders are not in the system yet, be careful of overriding the Pyxis. I know this is counterintuitive because you want to help the patient with their pain and you know that the doctor always orders the same medication. However, overriding the Pyxis without the physician’s order is a violation of the policies and procedures.
Lastly, if you work in a facility where your supervisor tells you it is okay to use the orders prior to transfer while the policies and procedures require you to obtain new orders, you’re in violation of the facilities policies and procedures.
As much as we want to help our patients and expedite care, we must be careful to be sure that we are doing things “by the book.” Any deviations outside your policies and procedures could cause you to be in trouble.
If you don’t know those policies and procedures, go review them as soon as you can to educate yourself and ensure that you are following them.
You may be surprised in what you find but more importantly you will also be better able to protect your patients and your license.
Is your job the right fit?
During this license renewal season, I have helped several nurses who were working at a place they knew was not the right fit for them, but continued to work there anyway. I call this “the square peg in the round hole”. The fit could be with your coworkers or with the type of unit and type of patients. No matter how hard you try to force that square peg into the round hole, it just will not fit. You can push it, smash it, ram it or hammer it, but it just won’t fit properly. Are you working in one of those places?
If you are working in a place that is not the right fit, it may catch up with you. Not only does it affect your health and wellbeing, but also your confidence. I always say you can get another job but you can’t get another license.
There are several reason why nurses stay at a place that is not a good fit for them. They may feel a loyalty to their patients. They may feel a loyalty to their coworkers. They may be paid higher than other places. They may fear not having a job. They may feel it is their fault they don’t belong.
I think the main reason people don’t leave is because they are comfortable where they are and fear the unknown. Even though they don’t fit in, there is a comfort and peace of having a job. The thought of leaving is very scary. The nurse may need to drive a long way to get another job, take a pay cut or even give up their day shift.
Whenever there is a decision that needs to be made, there are prices and payoffs. There are prices to pay for staying where you are such as your health and wellbeing and risk of discipline or termination. The payoffs are the supposed security of having a job and helping the patients that are there. There are also prices to pay for leaving such as giving up the security into an unknown environment at another job.
If you don’t fit in, ask yourself what prices are you willing to pay to stay there. Are you willing to risk your health and not sleeping well? Are you willing to get terminated? If you want to leave, what prices are you willing to pay? There is peace with making an informed decision. All the nurses I represented who worked in a place which was a bad fit and left have said “I am so glad I am out of there” and “If I knew it was so much better elsewhere, I would have left earlier.”
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