Loved My Day in OB!

I'm taking a quick break from studying for my Postpartum Hemmorhage simulation tomorrow to talk about my day at the CUMC Family Birth Center.... Because of my not so exciting experience a couple weeks ago, I did not come into today expecting much. I even brought notes to study for my next exam, thinking I would have time to stand around... That was a very wrong assumption! Today was filled with so many new activities for me, I can barely remember them all to tell everyone about!

(I have to be careful because of HIPPA but here is a quick run down of my day)
My two assigned patients today were special cases in Post Partum... both were very young girls, who luckily for me spoke english. One was in the hospital because she had a missed abortion, meaning there was still fetal material in her uterus which obviously needed to come out - she did not do this while I was there, and was scheduled for surgery for this afternoon after I left. I'll spare people the details of what that procedure would have been like - but what I DID get to do for her was give lots of IV meds, as well as take out her IV (because it was not working properly). I also took lots of vital signs, which is easy, but still hands on experience.

My next patient was what kept me quite busy all day. She had a crash c/s early the night before, due to severe abruption... basically the placenta which holds the baby was tearing away from the uterus. Not good, at all, especially since she was only at 26 weeks gestation. Her baby survived and was in the NICU, weighing about 1 pound and of course needing a lot of care. The patient complained of pain all day and at one point when I walked into the room my nurse just looked at me with wide eyes and said calmly "Meaghan I need you to go get a nurse for me. ANY NURSE. Please go get another nurse for me". Of course I went running to the nearest nurse I could find and brought her back ... long story short it was thought they were worried she would have a stroke or stop breathing or her heart would beat incorrectly. The patient panicked from teh extreme pain in her neck and chest area and then began hyperventilating.. Emergency oxygen was given as well as an immediate ECG done and then a chest xray and blood work were done. At the time I left, it was not known what had caused this episode of extreme pain. I forgot to mention one factor in all of this... cocaine. Both mom and baby were found to be positive for it...

On a happier note, I got to see my first vaginal delivery today! It was very quick but very interesting to watch. Teaching hospitals are crazy - there must have been about 15 people in the room with all the nursing students, nurses, med students, residents, and doctors! But everything was done quickly and efficiently, and wow did that baby pop out fast! I was told that is not common :) After the baby did come out, I got to assist with its first newborn assessment which means taking vital signs and blood sugar levels and an initial weight. Very healthy pink baby girl!


If that wasn't enough for ya, just want to mention that I did take care of 2 OTHER patients that my nurse had, just gave meds and took vitals and helped keep them comfortable....

Overall, an INCREDIBLE day. I am still smiling as I type this because I can't believe I got to do and see all that - It really makes me think this is an area I could definitely see myself working in! We'll see in a few months after I have other cool experiences at other clinical rotations though :)

Happy Halloween!

Well... its FRIDAY and HALLOWEEN! YAY!

Jeremy and I have been sooo busy the last week, he is working tons of hours at his new job and of course the teaching job, and I have been spending time at school and school related activities! This week I got to observe in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Creighton hospital for about 4 hours.

Because it is a specialty field and because my instructor was not there to observe, I didn't get to do much. I mostly walked around and asked questions while watching the nurses do assessments and give report... There was a creighton accelerated grad, who just graduated in August working for the first hour I was there, so it was fun to talk to her about her experience (and it made me feel a little better about feeling like I would never be able to remember everything I had learned!) she was very helpful and let me watch everything she was doing and explained it all as well... Another nurse was very nice and also explained everything and even let me listen to the babys heart and help give one little one a bath - I even got to hold one for a few minutes... A very fussy one that is! She kept turning her head looking for food and got all her tubes wrapped up (she was on oxygen nasal cannulas that kept falling out) but it was fun to hold her :)

Last night, I had to miss Greys Anatomy to go observe a Childbirth Education Class... It was the class's 6th and last session, so they were pretty knowledgeable, the information was very basic to me and I was happy to realize I knew almost all the answers to the instructors questions - NO that does not mean I want to have a baby anytime soon! It was so funny watching the [almost] new dads play with the dolls, learning how to "swaddle" and the proper positions for burping, etc.



Well, thats all for now - hope everyone has a safe and Happy Halloween!

If We Were Dogs....

killing time on a cloudy friday with some dorky online "quizzes"...
this is meaghan:

You Are a Labrador Retriever

You are very optimistic. You approach life with enthusiasm and vigor. You aim to please, and you are a very quick learner. You can be a bit rowdy and unruly, especially when you don't get enough exercise. While you are a bit wild, you're never dangerous. You are a truly gentle creature.

What Breed of Dog Are You?

and this is jeremy...

You Are an American Bulldog

You are a very imposing, powerful creature... but deep down, you're generally good natured. You are incredibly energetic, and you like to blow off steam with sports and horsing around. You are naturally courageous. You would run into a burning building to save someone you loved. You intimidate people without trying to. Some people assume the worst of you when they first meet you.

What Breed of Dog Are You?

Disappointing

Well day one was okay, but nothing special.... I pretty much did not get to do any assessments, or anything, because there were 2 other nurses working with my patient (who actually wanted to sleep most of the day).   Disappointing;  Mostly because my friend Angela got to see and do SO MUCH today!  I am so jealous of her :)   I did get to watch her patient get an epidural - which was cool, and not as horrible as I had imagined it would look like... But she got to place a catheter, give IV meds, AND the baby be delivered!  Granted, she spent an extra 2 hours at the hospital, but still - how cool!    I just hope I get to experience those things sometime in the next 3 weeks!

Tommorrow... Thursday

Tomorrow is my first day of OB clinical at Creighton University Medical Center....   If you have been watching national news then you may recognize that hospital as the one where kids keep getting dropped off at because of Nebraska's "Safe Haven" law. If you haven't heard of this, look it up, its crazy.     Anyways, pretty excited for the experience since I did my nursing assistant work in postpartum care back home in Bellevue but also nervous/not excited because the students at this rotation before me did not have the best time.  Oh well, we will see starting tomorrow I guess :)

Thursday = my mom coming to visit!  Yay!  Can't wait to see you mom.

3rd Week of Long Term Care

Tomorrow brings the last 2 days of clinicals at long term care... which I'm pretty excited about! I love the instructors in this rotation, but just not the work. Anyways, just wanted to share a story from last week...  

I was caring for a resident who was mostly independent. She suffered a stroke about 10 years ago, and has been living with its consequences ever since. Like I said before, she is mostly dependent, which means she can do activities of daily life mostly on her own (in the long term care setting - not at a house) so I found myself spending most of my time with her just talking to her and her husband, whom she shared a room with.  Besides that I was so thrilled to see this couple still in love and caring for each other so strongly after so many years of life, it was great getting to watch their interactions. Because of her stroke, my resident was

 unable to speak well - she could say some things, and her husband seemed to understand her quite well. A favorite phrase of hers when she was not understood was "oh piss" so as you can imagine, the days were filled with quite a few laughs :)  She also liked to make humming and clicking noises when I was listening to her lungs... Oh and moaned when I gave her insulin shots!  It was funny, but not as funny to my instructor since I didn't get all my assessments done!  Haha, anyways.... 

The BEST part of this story was last Thursday, my last day with her, when it happened to be "Oktoberfest" during lunch at the facility... The tables had beer mugs on them, they served brats, and even tastes of O'Douls beer!  They also had an accordion player singing and playing sauerkraut traditional German music... Now remember how I mentioned above that my resident could not speak very well?   

WELL when I visited her at the lunch table, imagine my surprise to hear her SINGING ALONG with the music.  She knew/said a lot of the words, not to mention was clapping her hands, and had the biggest smile on her face!   Her husband even told me that she had previously

 been standing in front of her wheelchair "dancing"!  I wish I would have seen it - but still, this really touched me and hit home for me the damage a stroke can do.  In her case, the stroke had damaged the speech part of her brain (Left) and because the right side was still intact, she was able to sing almost perfectly!    

I am amazed at what the body can do and can not wait to see what else I will learn from my patients throughout the rest of this 8 months of nursing school!! 

P.S.

LoTs of new pictures up on my shutterfly site! 

      State fair, August trip to Oregon, Scrub pics, ANC Cocktail Party, etc. etc.!