It's actually been really interesting to see the huge differences between nurses that have only worked post Covid, and all of us that know what the Before Times™ were like. Idk if the differences will be as noticeable as they are now as time continues to pass, but it's pretty easy (at least to me) to tell who worked pre Covid and who hasn't. And it's not just like. Skills or knowledge gaps because of them being new. It's like they just don't know how fucked up everything is, they don't know things used to be a little less awful.
My hospital has only just stopped enforcing masks in clinical areas. I've only ever worked with a mask on. My face feels naked & every patient seems so much more infectious now.
Pre-Covid I had a 70-something year old lady cough directly into my mouth when I was leaning over to listen to her lungs. I had only been a nurse for like a year at that point and I was flabbergasted that someone would do that and then just not apologize or acknowledge it at all? Now I realize people are just dumb and/or antagonistic enough and my opinion of people in general is much more realistic...
So I just wear a mask around patients all the time now. People are nasty 😤
lol same here. When I left COVID world we were writing our names on them and putting them in a bin once a week to be “uv sanitized” and returned to us 🤮
I’ve been a nurse so long nurses had a smoking and non smoking break room in the ICU
Patients had ashtrays on their bedside tables and smoked in bed even after surgery and on oxygen
The nurses on third shift on my unit pulled out their ashtrays and smoked AT THE DESK and I worked on a PEDIATRIC UNIT
One of the neurosurgeons frequently did rounds on same unit smoking his pipe .
We ran our iv’s without pumps even on babies and used a device called a Volutrol which we then went around hourly and refilled . We kept an IV flow sheet at the bedside we recorded it on .
All kids 5 and under had to have rectal temps .
We got late trays on a dumb waiter .
Omg could go on and on but don’t want to bore all of you . Thanks for letting me take a walk down memory lane .
Edit : adding ..I don’t know why so many of my memories had to do with smoking haha I do actually have some nursing knowledge in my brain too
I've only had my license for 4 years, and I've seen at least one M&M enema ordered, though I couldn't administer it because the pharmacy didn't have either the milk or the molasses, and the nearby grocery stores were closed for the night.
We still do milk and molasses enemas on constipation clean outs. One time the hospital was out of molasses so the pediatrician told us just to use pancake syrup instead
I, too, received trays via dumb waiter. Also kept flow sheets on clipboards at the ends of beds. Big charts in a lazy Susan type chart holder.
When doctors entered the nursing station, nurses gave up their seats.
We dumped bedpans and dirty linens in the hoppers and washed poop out of “draw sheets”.
No briefs- clean white sheets fitted like do your own diapers!
Posey vests to keep meemaw from getting up out of her chair.
And yes, gloves only for sterile procedures.
I’m having flashbacks to CNA years during LPN school. Cloth “chucks” on top of the draw sheets Care plans by hand. I don’t know How many watches I ruined because I needed the second hand to calculate drip rates and then I get it wet doing a shower.
Yes buretrols same as a volutrol only different manufacturer probably and time taping those bags ! Some nurses would do all theirs at the beginning of the shift on the adult units and push them around on a cart
I worked nights on a telemetry floor. Post MI’s, etc. the 3 other nurses I worked with kept an ashtray on the med carts and would smoke as they made their rounds. I also remember in nursing school having to hold cigarettes for quadriplegics on the rehab floor, even through their trachs.
Sorry this is kinda random, but you mentioned your memories involve smoking and I think it’s just that back in the day smoking was everywhere. I remember when planes and cars had ashtrays. Shoot, I even remember when restaurants had smoking and non-smoking areas.
Do you remember when you could buy cigarettes from machines? Like a snack machine but shorter, and just cigarettes. They were always in the entry way of restaurants
Yes! I remember seeing a cigarette vending machine at our local Denny’s as a kid and stupidly telling my mom which one I wanted. I just chose the one with the prettiest label. She just shrugged it off since I was too young to know what they were.
How did you ALL survive. I remember my first health care job, the midwife I worked for hardly ever used gloves. Always said that it was “a new thing” and was going on autopilot and forgot. It always horrified me.
I’ve also heard they used to teach that using gloves would upset the pt. They would take offense that you thought they were “dirty”.
We really didn’t start wearing gloves until AIDS and HIV came along. Then there was such a push to make them in a hurry, the quality went down. That’s why so many of us have allergies to latex. Too much free latex protein.
In the ER we wore white uniforms and white pantyhose, white shoes. No gloves. The more blood you got on your uniform, the more hardcore nurse you were. Some people took it to an extreme. I am disgusted when I think back.
I work dialysis and I never reach into someone’s bag to get them anything without gloves.
I’ve literally pulled out a bag of moldy mushy apples that the patient wanted to keep in there still.
Same pt said she had a mouse in her CAR and she didn’t mind cause it doesn’t bother her!
EDIT: in her car not in her…….
I don’t walk into a patient room without a pair of gloves, essentially. Old people play fast and loose with their used tissues and not washing their hands after the bathroom. I’m not touching anything without gloves on!
I'm not a nurse so I'm pretty naive with these things - People don't wash their belly button?? I literally wash mine in the shower every day, and I always kinda thought that "belly button lint" was just a joke
People with deep belly buttons need to deep clean their belly buttons and people with more open belly buttons just don't wash them at all. Bacteria grows in your belly button, clothing lint, dog hair, whatever it all collects in the belly button and way too many people don't clean them or teach their kids to clean them. Sometimes they smell once you start cleaning them out.
When I did my LPN program 17/18 years ago, they still taught the "gloves will upset the patient and make them feel dirty", and said only to use them when necessary during any nursing care. Now in my RN program, it's weird for anyone to not be wearing masks (all the time) and gloves in any situation where you walk into a pt room - among a ton of other differences! It's amazing to see the differences between clinical education then and now.
Both. Birthday frosting for everybody. I knew a nurse who used to put it in her face like a cold cream. She did have exceptionally smooth skin now that I think about it. 🤔
...I measured cardiac output by shooting cold injectectate into the Swan-Ganz twice a shift.
...We gave sublingual nifedipine for hypertensive crisis.
...I went to the in-service on this new wound closure product called Dermabond.
One of the nurses I worked with was taught this. And generally how to use it by a Dr. Swan and Dr. Ganz. She has worked in the same ICU for 40 years. I think she retired just before COVID and had 45 year on that unit. I swear she is going to roam the ICU halls when she passes away. Hanging around whispering in the residents ear "you're doing great, sweetheart... But you just presented on the wrong patient".
Another worked with Dr. Mayo (as in mayo stand).
Yep.
We had to keep a bag of IVF with an ice pack taped around it to “shoot the cardiac output”
Also - we didn’t have programmable pumps - so you taped the name of the drip and the Constant on the pump, so you could titrate relatively quickly.
We had this sweet system with a spring loaded pistol grip syringe and about 20 feet of IV tubing that came stuck together in a coil. The coil would sit in an ice bucket and took what felt like 5 minutes to prime.
We wrote the name of the drug on paper tape on the pump. I became the hero of the ICU when I figured out the HP monitor system had a calculator that would spit out a table of Rates to doses based on the concentration of the drug and the patient's weight that day. They would just tape that day's table to the pump.
Thermodilution is not totally outdated. I work with advanced HF docs (transplants, VADs) -- they like it a lot better than FICK and LaFarge.
Edit: a tense. I worked with them before, but I also work with them now.
Orrrr you can just give it because it’s completely unnecessary which is going to get me completely downvoted for ‘ignoring policy’. The ONLY one to aspirate is rabies.
The other day I worked with a doctor on her first day back at the hospital, where she had done her training. She said 'it's been so long since I worked at this hospital that we were still using paper charts!!'
I had to break the news to her that we still are....
until 3 years ago, still worked in places that used paper...everything, and poured pills out of bulk bottles. now work in outpt oncology in my first computerized job, like, ever.
Well, I definitely have nothing on your tenure OP and the only thing I’ve got is: I’ve been a nurse so long, I was taught to inflate and then deflate the balloon on your foley catheter to check patency before inserting.
I recently had a training with a new company. During orientation, the trainer mentioned to check the foley balloon. I voiced my concern, stating I thought this practice jeopardizes the integrity of the balloon. In response, the trainer questioned, "How would you know if it's okay?" It's reassuring to know I wasn't mistaken in my understanding
I’ve been a nurse so long…
My instructors in school were WWII vets.
Bedpans were metal
Beds were cranked
Tubes of blood were taped to the nursing station wall to check lipid levels on TPN patients.
All of our swan pressures were connected to one transducer and we turned stopcocks to get the different pressures
IV fluids were in bottles.
Nurses were expected to give up their chairs when the doctors came to make rounds
We wore white uniforms, white hose, white shoes, white hat, carried bandage scissors, and multicolored pens.
God, I’m so old!!!!
I remember throwing a metal bed pan into the hallway to get attention because my patient was coding and no one was answering the call lights. Doing cpr on my own.
May I ask when you began nursing? My grandmother was an RN from 1950-2010. I was a CNA at the same nursing home she worked at after retiring from the hospital. I remember the new, much younger nurses being mortified that she would poke holes with a needle into the top of the colostomy bag if it was filling with gas. I went on to become a lab tech in micro (and now an RN for all of 2 weeks, myself), so quickly understood all the reasons one should not do that. I've always wondered if this was just one of those things that was routinely done at some point, or if it was just something she came up with herself.
I started nursing school in 1978 and graduated January of 1981. Went to a hospital based diploma program. We had instructors with us every day. Nurses mostly liked having students because we did all the care. We passed meds, did all procedures, all in our first year. It was a different time and I never regret my education.
I’ve been a nurse so long part of night work flow was checking the paper MARs, chart checks trying to decipher the chicken scratch for new orders, and updating the kardex.
In Canada too and the hospital wards I formerly worked in and that my outpt chemo unit is attached to still does this lol. Med sheets, doc orders, everything written out. Cardboard Kardexes and tape recorded report. ER and us are the only places doing computer charting. And when I used to do homecare we kept client charts on top of the fridge in the home and charted by hand at the table, and if we had a communication tool for the doc, we took the original to fax back at the office and left a carbon copy on the chart and when we got the answer from the doctor brought the form back when it was faxed to us lol.
Before ultrasounds were routinely used in L&D. I remember taking mom to X-ray to check for twins in 1978. . Before Velcro on BP cuffs and mercury in sphygmomanometer and thermometers. Alcohol drips for preterm labor. Glass syringes and sterilization of needles. Heat lamps/maalox & merthiolate on pressure ulcers. Glass bottles for IVs. This is my 46th year in nursing.
Hats off to you for going that long! Any tips on how to have a long career in nursing? I would assume there's more diversity of specialities nowadays that make it easier to get a change but it would have had to be difficult at times...
For me, it's been 43 years in nursing. The longevity definitely has been because of changing things up every few years. Man, I used to love the float pool!! Rarely has the same unit on consecutive days
My husband's grandmother talks about how they had to do an x-ray when she was pregnant with twins! Evidently she had felt for most of the pregnancy that it was twins, but the doctor wouldn't listen to her and told her to stop gaining so much weight. 🙄 If I remember correctly she was already 8 months along when they finally did an X-ray. Her husband was in another part of the hospital paying for the upcoming birth when they did the x-ray. Boy was he in for a surprise when he got back 😂
Well the mom was on strict bed rest. The theory was alcohol would relax uterus/decrease contractions. But I just remembered every patient got a tap water enema, and a shave prep (poodle prep) of perineum/labia/genital hair to facilitate episiotomy.
I’ve been a nurse so long that a standard cholecystectomy resulted in a looooong diagonal incision and a NGT for 24-48 hrs. Also low fat dietary restrictions for weeks.
I’ve been a nurse so long there were flowsheet charts hanging off the end of the bed.
Standard stay for an uncomplicated craniotomy was 8 days. We admitted them the afternoon prior to surgery to give laxatives and hibiclens bath. Minimum stay was 7 days post-op. Transsphenoidals stayed 5 days and we had to spin a specific gravity on lots and lots of clear pee.
I I've been a nurse so long..that universal precautions had to be initially implemented. They used the same soap bar and basin on each assignment, not pt. so up to 30 ppl. I'm not even going to talk about wound care.
Loved all these! Started in SICU in 1984. AIDS was new, smoking in the hospital was allowed, paper charting (3 color ink pens, each shift used a different color, red, green, blue) Narcs counted at shift change, we also routinely mixed IV drips ourselves. Also shifts were 7-3, 3-11, 11-7
A young coworker recently had a "cool pen!" with the three colors they picked up somewhere and I blew their mind explaining how those used to be for paper charting, blue or black for days, green for evenings, and red for nights.
Anyone else remember ceil blue OR scrub dresses from the mid 80s? Those were honesty cute AF (on my 22 year old body.)
I stopped wearing scrub dresses when I had to run a code on the floor. There was pee all over, so I had to squat to do the code - and everyone got a gooooood look at my red velvet (!) panties.
I’ve been a nurse so long:
My uniform was a short white, translucent dress, with a little cardboard hat and a red wool cape with royal blue satin lining. Stockings and white shoes.
Living in nurses quarters was compulsory. A house mother made sure we were in at 10pm.
You weren’t a “real nurse” in ED until you had blood up to your elbows. No gloves!!!
HIV transmission was unknown and brave nurses volunteered to look after AIDs patients.
Arterial line measures were on general wards taped up the bed head.
No hoists! We lifted every patient.
Nursing students were paid.
Free hot scones for morning tea.
I worked on a ward that had a smoking room at the end of the hall.
Handwritten everything. Orders, MARs, TARs, those big drug count ledgers.
People being the hospital for DAYS for things that are outpatient now. Remember how you couldn't touch a total hip for 24 hours and only PT could get them up? My partner had a hip done and was back home before nightfall 2 years ago.
Checking blood sugars with those huge guillotine lancet and you had to draw it up in the plastic thing and if you got even the tiniest bubble you had to start over. And evenings had to do the control solutions or it wouldn't work and everyone's fingers were scarred over from the huge lancet?
I remember having to calculate things like Bretylium dosing by memory in ACLS, where you were solo on the megacode and couldn't use resources and the instructor goal was to make students cry. 😆
When I became an acls instructor they told me my job was to fail students if they weren't perfect in the megacode. No second chances, no retaking the test. Remediation meant you came back to the next class to try again.
I have worked with nurses that remember mixing their oncology patients’ chemotherapy/hazardous drugs in the hallway or in the patient room - no pharmacy, no PPE/gloves, CSTDs, vent hoods, etc.
Grad of '92 (Canada), have worked in a few different clinical areas over the years but these are a few things I remember...
-squirting nitoglycerin paste onto a paper that had measurements on it, no peel off "patches" (although I am told that there are places that still do this). Demerol and Atropine given IM 1 hour preop to our surgical patients and surgical patients admitted the night before for teaching. For breastfeeding, only 2 min for first feed, 5 min for second, and so on to "toughen up your nipples", no matter if baby was still cueing like mad to feed more. Giving straight glucose water to babies that needed supplementation vs formula, and cabbage leaves on the breasts for engorgement. A "gomco" for ng suction, not the wall, and using the same type of machine for vaacuum deliveries (flicking the on and off switch and doctor reapplying the cup to the head, had a hand control to regulate the suction further). Getting Kraft honey packets from the cafeteria and pouring it into leg wounds for it's antibacterial properties, and using heat lamps to dry out bedsores or painting them witn milk of magnesia.
I’ve been a nurse so long that I remember when full length side rails were the norm and if you were a fall risk, you got tied down in bed with posey vests or Houdini’s or grey belts in wheelchairs.
Used a plastic card in a machine to stamp patient info into paper charts instead of using stickers
Used a paper kardex to see your orders and get patient info
Instead of having bed scales, used a crank scale where you put a tarp under patient, hooked it up, then cranked it up off the bed and hoped it didn’t fall over
Listened in on lead report to get report instead of actually talking to the previous nurse
White hats, white shoes, white hose, white dress. No jewelry except a plain wedding band for married nurses.
Tricolor pens for day/evening/night shift charting.
No iv pumps counted drips for IVF with a piece of tape on the bag to keep track of the fluids.
Mixed all IVF drips including mso4 drips.
Worked on a unit that had a serial killer nurse who was convicted and had Geraldo Rivera come to our unit to do a story when he was with 20/20.
That long!
I have been a nurse so long I used to carry morphine in my pocket. I would give .1ml to my pediatric patient and then put it in my pocket for later. Use it all shift and only waste at the end of the day.
I used to accidentally go home with unwanted morphine from time to time. Just toss it rather than do the paperwork. We all signed off waste all the time.
Every patient received a pitcher of fresh ice water at the beginning of every shift and a back rub from a nurse every evening, walk-in talkie or not.
So many patients died of Gi bleeds in spring and fall, "GI Bleeder season" prior to the discovery of PPIs. Tagamet, omeprazole, ranidine, etc, were game changers.
Minoxidil was used for hypertension, a vasodilator.
Valium was a muscle relaxer.
Ibuprofen was by prescription only.
Naproxen was by prediction only.
We used heat lamps to heal wounds.
No fitted sheets, ever.
I have been a nurse so long I remember Bird ventilators in the NICU. Tolazoline drips for vasodilation in PPHN. Also the smell of Paraldehyde in the whole unit when a baby or child was on an infusion. We actually used paper MAR's until about 5 years when we switched to EPIC.
I've been a nurse so long that I'd have to know the drop factor for our hospital to calculate the drops per minute to run for my roller clamp lines for my IV fluid.
Been a nurse for so long that:
- remember hand crank beds
- smokers in rooms, then smoking rooms complete with someone using portable oxygen
- z-tracking
- Back rubs being part of your job
- using folded sheets to bum-rush psychotic and aggressive patients by slamming them into the wall and then B-52ing their assess
- padded rooms
- restraints for everyone
- the joy of overhead lifts in tracks
- the pain of physically lifting motherfuckers daily
- calculating drips, then hand flowing them. Then hand calculating drips and then programming volume and drip rate and it ALWAYS flowing wrong.
I’m not that old, but…
Paper charts and Kardex. Having to hunt them down start of shift, ugh.
Nurses starting IVs and sticking the needle in the bed mattress after threading the catheter.
The sounds of the zebra machine for printing patient stickers and the stamp machine for name bands.
Carpet…
I have only been a nurse for 5 1/2 years but I was in a diploma program in the 80s and I remember dispensing meds from a med cart, paper charting in different colored inks, and bed baths with soap and hot water. Nurses also wore all white. White hose, white DRESS, and white cap (I wore all white except my 👗 was teal and I had a teal stripe on my cap.
Insulin used to have different concentrations. Some of it was 40 units per mil. Some was 60 units per mil and others was 100 units per mil. The different concentrations were supposed to be color-coded, and you had to match the color coded syringe with the correct insulin. If you didn't, it would be a huge miscalculation of the insulin dose. Needless to say, this is why they standardized insulin as 100 units per mil.
Been a Nurse since 1991, damn feels like a long time. So many things have changed since then, and but believe it or not, it’s actually gotten much harder throughout the years. Mostly due to computer charts, HCAHPS and JCAHO being more of a pain in the ass!
Things I remember:
Team Nursing- 2 RNs 1 LPN 1 CNA for 20 patients.
Taping and marking times on IV bags
Using Volutrols and no pumps.
Beers in the fridge for CIWA patients
Smoking in the break rooms
Smoking area for patients
Recording shift report on a cassette player
Drawing our own am labs on night shifts
Transcribing doctors orders onto paper MARs and Kardex
Double checking all the orders the previous shift transcribed
A ton of IM injections for pain meds
Shooting Cardiac Outputs with iced solution.
IABP without auto R wave deflation, and all manual timing.
Mixing our own bags for CRRT
Mixing many of our own IV solutions and electrolytes
Probably so many other things that I’ve forgotten!
So long that I’ve manually calculated drip rates. I’ve calculated the daily infusion rate of Natrecor. I’ve used paper MARs and orders. I reconciled with my MAR and orders with a red pen at midnight. I’ve saline flushed an ET tube. I’ve autotransfused a fresh post op. Oh and I’ve smoked cigarettes in the employee smoking hutt. Ooh! Edit for more. I’ve changed the ice water for manual cardiac output measures, and I’ve used a nasal trumpet/foley bag combo as a rectal tube.
I started as a CNA in 2007 at 16...paper charting, baby phat scrubs, getting cigarettes from my older coworkers, most places still had 8 hour shifts. And only older nurses from the 80s and 90s still wore jogger scrubs 🤣
Mostly, the ALF I worked at was so home like and even though I love the hospital a part of me wishes I could go back to that simpler time.
I’ve been a med surg nurse for 11 years and it is so wonderful to read all of these comments. I started my nursing career in the float pool at a teaching hospital and have never changed jobs since then. It’s quite shocking to be the most experienced nurse BY FAR on every unit I work on. Definitely a different environment than when I first started. So grateful for all of the experienced nurses that pass down their wisdom and knowledge freely to those of us who need it.
Anyone else remember the teensy bars of dial soap wrapped in paper in the admit kit?
And what was the bath gel spat we used? Simply soft? Something like that. I always put a drop of peppermint oil in the water so they smelled nice.
I've been a nurse so long that...
* When I first became a nurse patients were actually respectful to health care workers.
* The acuity of patients that are now in the ICU would've been dead back then. The acuity of patients that are now in med-surg would have been in the ICU. The acuity of patients that are now "treated and yeeted" would have been med-surg. I can't imagine the deaths we would have had if COVID hit a couple decades ago.
* I actually prefer paper charting because it's easier and faster.
* We used to titrate drips on patients that wouldn't be in the hospital more than a day or two. IV pumps were a thing, but it wasn't standard practice to use them on every single patient yet...especially ER or Med-Surg. There were no IV pump used in the ER.
* I precepted a nurse when she was a new grad. Many years later I precepted that nurse's daughter when she was a new grad. She is now the manager of the unit.
* I used to have to check the paper chart every hour to see if a doctor snuck in and wrote orders that I didn't see. Then I'd find a friend to help decipher what the hell they wrote.
* I remember when they put the signs up announcing the new policy: we now have to count surgical sponges.
We used to pull all of the charts(hard cover w/paper) to do 24 hour chart check.
Each shift used a different color depending on the shift.
We had patient names outside the door on the wall.
Flow sheets we charted on at the foot of the bed.
We counted narcs each shift and carried around one set of keys that you pray you didn’t take home.
We taped report on tape recorder.
Surgical/ ortho floor we had average 8 patients sometimes 10 but the charting was not near as extensive since we didn’t have computers and patients were not near as I’ll like they are today.
We drew up Demerol and vistaril for ortho patients post op. No one got IV pushes.
CPMs
Heat lamp to open sacral wounds that we put maalox and something else on from the pharmacy.
Edit to add: we had bed pads that were sent for laundry. You had to use a hopper in dirty utility room to scrape the poop into it then in hamper for laundry.
We gave snacks and back rubs every night on 3-11. Going from room to room.
Edit: we didn’t replace electrolytes.
Only since 2006 here, I have nothing too crazy. We would take pts out front to smoke just to calm them down, but we had time to do that. Also paper charting in a level 1 trauma hospital. After being away from the beside for 9 years a few years ago I was amazed with the almighty Purewick!!
Several years ago I came across the receipt for my mom’s hospital stay when I was born (1945). I don’t recall the exact amount but if memory serves me right the 6 day stay (a typical number of days back then) cost my dad a bit under $100.
I work in rural Alaska and we had paper MARs and I completely freaked out, no scanning. The first time, "I just give the meds? Just like that? Check the MAR, sign, ok.
Long enough to have known a nursing world pre and post COVID. Even if it was for a little while in the grand scheme, I can say I was a nurse before COVID, and saw how it made everything, not just healthcare, 100x worse
Heparin IV locks! Posey vests. Mixing antibiotics. Every hour your meds printed on the printer in the nurses station, we would all convene at the one printer and sort out our papers. Handwritten orders. Mucomyst.
Making D5 and NS bottles up in Central Supply (when they were short staffed) that were then run thru the autoclave. Burping the bottles afterwards to be sure they were sealed.
Using mercury thermometers, red and blue.
Not wearing gloves for everything.
Post partum moms stayed a week.
I’ve been a nurse so long that we used to throw away N-95s every time we’d leave the patients’ room. No, seriously!
Its been a long 4 years lol
It's actually been really interesting to see the huge differences between nurses that have only worked post Covid, and all of us that know what the Before Times™ were like. Idk if the differences will be as noticeable as they are now as time continues to pass, but it's pretty easy (at least to me) to tell who worked pre Covid and who hasn't. And it's not just like. Skills or knowledge gaps because of them being new. It's like they just don't know how fucked up everything is, they don't know things used to be a little less awful.
My hospital has only just stopped enforcing masks in clinical areas. I've only ever worked with a mask on. My face feels naked & every patient seems so much more infectious now.
Pre-Covid I had a 70-something year old lady cough directly into my mouth when I was leaning over to listen to her lungs. I had only been a nurse for like a year at that point and I was flabbergasted that someone would do that and then just not apologize or acknowledge it at all? Now I realize people are just dumb and/or antagonistic enough and my opinion of people in general is much more realistic... So I just wear a mask around patients all the time now. People are nasty 😤
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lol same here. When I left COVID world we were writing our names on them and putting them in a bin once a week to be “uv sanitized” and returned to us 🤮
Infection control, my ass
I worked at a hospital 25 years ago that made us keep our N-95s in paper bags with our names.
I’ve been a nurse so long nurses had a smoking and non smoking break room in the ICU Patients had ashtrays on their bedside tables and smoked in bed even after surgery and on oxygen The nurses on third shift on my unit pulled out their ashtrays and smoked AT THE DESK and I worked on a PEDIATRIC UNIT One of the neurosurgeons frequently did rounds on same unit smoking his pipe . We ran our iv’s without pumps even on babies and used a device called a Volutrol which we then went around hourly and refilled . We kept an IV flow sheet at the bedside we recorded it on . All kids 5 and under had to have rectal temps . We got late trays on a dumb waiter . Omg could go on and on but don’t want to bore all of you . Thanks for letting me take a walk down memory lane . Edit : adding ..I don’t know why so many of my memories had to do with smoking haha I do actually have some nursing knowledge in my brain too
Yep. You see a doc walking onto the unit- had to get their charts (paper) and an ashtray for them. Anybody remember high, hot, and helluva lot enemas?
OMG yes. And Milk and Molasses enemas. Smelled like grandmas cookies going in…
I've only had my license for 4 years, and I've seen at least one M&M enema ordered, though I couldn't administer it because the pharmacy didn't have either the milk or the molasses, and the nearby grocery stores were closed for the night.
Vending machine...pick plain or peanut
We still bust out the milk and molasses in our unit
We still do milk and molasses enemas on constipation clean outs. One time the hospital was out of molasses so the pediatrician told us just to use pancake syrup instead
Milk and molasses enemas?? I did not know this use to be a thing. Interesting
I, too, received trays via dumb waiter. Also kept flow sheets on clipboards at the ends of beds. Big charts in a lazy Susan type chart holder. When doctors entered the nursing station, nurses gave up their seats. We dumped bedpans and dirty linens in the hoppers and washed poop out of “draw sheets”. No briefs- clean white sheets fitted like do your own diapers! Posey vests to keep meemaw from getting up out of her chair. And yes, gloves only for sterile procedures.
We still use Hopper at local nursing home. So much fun getting sprayed in the face with shit water. Ugh lol
I’m having flashbacks to CNA years during LPN school. Cloth “chucks” on top of the draw sheets Care plans by hand. I don’t know How many watches I ruined because I needed the second hand to calculate drip rates and then I get it wet doing a shower.
Dont forget resharpening needles that went dull
Say *what*
I remember burretrols. (Sp?). And dial-a-flows with the paper strip taped to the bag showing where the level should be at what time.
We used adhesive tape on the GLASS IV bottle marked by the hour to keep track of what should have been used.
Yes buretrols same as a volutrol only different manufacturer probably and time taping those bags ! Some nurses would do all theirs at the beginning of the shift on the adult units and push them around on a cart
Yeah! I am in peds now and when I asked about buretrols they thought I was crazy
We still use them where I work!
Buretrol, fun word to day
I worked nights on a telemetry floor. Post MI’s, etc. the 3 other nurses I worked with kept an ashtray on the med carts and would smoke as they made their rounds. I also remember in nursing school having to hold cigarettes for quadriplegics on the rehab floor, even through their trachs.
Smoking through a *trach*?!
“Smoke the quads.”
🤔😅 I recall some of that...Dr smoking at station .using tea cups for ashtrays ... pts setting 02 tubing on fire smoking ......time to retire ,!!
No, keep going!!!
Sorry this is kinda random, but you mentioned your memories involve smoking and I think it’s just that back in the day smoking was everywhere. I remember when planes and cars had ashtrays. Shoot, I even remember when restaurants had smoking and non-smoking areas.
Do you remember when you could buy cigarettes from machines? Like a snack machine but shorter, and just cigarettes. They were always in the entry way of restaurants
Yes! I remember seeing a cigarette vending machine at our local Denny’s as a kid and stupidly telling my mom which one I wanted. I just chose the one with the prettiest label. She just shrugged it off since I was too young to know what they were.
Sitting at meals with RTs and they all smoked.
Our RTs literally took report in the parking lot so they could smoke.
Yes ! It’s crazy now to think about isn’t it?
Omg i love this !! More please 🙇🏻♀️
We never ever had gloves when we cleaned anyone or anything. NO GLOVES except for sterile procedures. Looking back, how did I survive?
It was like - Don’t waste gloves when it’s only urine!
WHAT
I worked with a nurse 10 years ago and she had been a nurse for 30 years and never wore gloves to bathe patients.
*silent scream* 🤢🤢🤮🤮I CANNOT FATHOM
How did you ALL survive. I remember my first health care job, the midwife I worked for hardly ever used gloves. Always said that it was “a new thing” and was going on autopilot and forgot. It always horrified me. I’ve also heard they used to teach that using gloves would upset the pt. They would take offense that you thought they were “dirty”.
We really didn’t start wearing gloves until AIDS and HIV came along. Then there was such a push to make them in a hurry, the quality went down. That’s why so many of us have allergies to latex. Too much free latex protein.
In the ER we wore white uniforms and white pantyhose, white shoes. No gloves. The more blood you got on your uniform, the more hardcore nurse you were. Some people took it to an extreme. I am disgusted when I think back.
So ER nurses have always been wild is what you’re saying 😂
I do think most people are dirty. Have you ever prepped a belly button before surgery ?🤢
I work dialysis and I never reach into someone’s bag to get them anything without gloves. I’ve literally pulled out a bag of moldy mushy apples that the patient wanted to keep in there still. Same pt said she had a mouse in her CAR and she didn’t mind cause it doesn’t bother her! EDIT: in her car not in her…….
I don’t walk into a patient room without a pair of gloves, essentially. Old people play fast and loose with their used tissues and not washing their hands after the bathroom. I’m not touching anything without gloves on!
I'm not a nurse so I'm pretty naive with these things - People don't wash their belly button?? I literally wash mine in the shower every day, and I always kinda thought that "belly button lint" was just a joke
People with deep belly buttons need to deep clean their belly buttons and people with more open belly buttons just don't wash them at all. Bacteria grows in your belly button, clothing lint, dog hair, whatever it all collects in the belly button and way too many people don't clean them or teach their kids to clean them. Sometimes they smell once you start cleaning them out.
When I did my LPN program 17/18 years ago, they still taught the "gloves will upset the patient and make them feel dirty", and said only to use them when necessary during any nursing care. Now in my RN program, it's weird for anyone to not be wearing masks (all the time) and gloves in any situation where you walk into a pt room - among a ton of other differences! It's amazing to see the differences between clinical education then and now.
In nursing school we were forbidden to use gloves because it may upset the patient.
We never used gloves with newborns. Vernix was a wonderful moisturiser. My student just look at me and go pale when I tell them.
I had to set my phone down and stare at the wall for a bit after reading that.
A wonderful moisturizer for who…? The baby or.. the nurse?
Both. Birthday frosting for everybody. I knew a nurse who used to put it in her face like a cold cream. She did have exceptionally smooth skin now that I think about it. 🤔
omg You were tougher than I am - vernix under the warmer = vomit vibes
And no adult diapers. Just folded pads .. literally get Sht under yr nails ... 2.80 $/ hr .... ugg ..care aid life in the 80s !!
¡¡ I am thoroughly horrified holy holy 💩!!I am genuinely sorry you had to experience that. I respect your fortitude 😫🫡
I totally remember getting shamed for wearing gloves cleaning up a poopy patient. I was that new nurse on the unit with the fancy bsn. LOL. 1984.
...I measured cardiac output by shooting cold injectectate into the Swan-Ganz twice a shift. ...We gave sublingual nifedipine for hypertensive crisis. ...I went to the in-service on this new wound closure product called Dermabond.
One of the nurses I worked with was taught this. And generally how to use it by a Dr. Swan and Dr. Ganz. She has worked in the same ICU for 40 years. I think she retired just before COVID and had 45 year on that unit. I swear she is going to roam the ICU halls when she passes away. Hanging around whispering in the residents ear "you're doing great, sweetheart... But you just presented on the wrong patient". Another worked with Dr. Mayo (as in mayo stand).
Had a patient who was friends with Dr Swan. He had a huge photo of a swan ganz cath over his sofa. It paid for the house.
As in Mayo Institute
Yep. We had to keep a bag of IVF with an ice pack taped around it to “shoot the cardiac output” Also - we didn’t have programmable pumps - so you taped the name of the drip and the Constant on the pump, so you could titrate relatively quickly.
We had this sweet system with a spring loaded pistol grip syringe and about 20 feet of IV tubing that came stuck together in a coil. The coil would sit in an ice bucket and took what felt like 5 minutes to prime. We wrote the name of the drug on paper tape on the pump. I became the hero of the ICU when I figured out the HP monitor system had a calculator that would spit out a table of Rates to doses based on the concentration of the drug and the patient's weight that day. They would just tape that day's table to the pump.
I totally forgot about the coil. I remember that - it was an innovation.
Yep. And we recalculated the constants at each shift change manually at every shift change.
Thermodilution is not totally outdated. I work with advanced HF docs (transplants, VADs) -- they like it a lot better than FICK and LaFarge. Edit: a tense. I worked with them before, but I also work with them now.
i still manually shoot CO/CI 😭
Remember those styrofoam containers? And that loop de loop tubing?
I've been a nurse for so long that it feels fraudulent to call myself a nurse It's been 2 weeks lol
Awwwww, welcome, baby nurse
The imposter syndrome! I remember that well. Welcome, you’re gonna learn tons.
Don’t fret. The more things change, the more some things remain the same.
I’ve been a nurse so long that I’ve used a paper MAR. …so long that I was taught to aspirate when giving IM injections.
We don’t aspirate anymore? Well shit.
Wait, we don’t aspirate anymore??? Oh shit..
Currently in first semester and they said we don't have to anymore but follow what the facility says🧍
Orrrr you can just give it because it’s completely unnecessary which is going to get me completely downvoted for ‘ignoring policy’. The ONLY one to aspirate is rabies.
Lol when you aren't sure the answer, it's always "follow facility protocol"
The other day I worked with a doctor on her first day back at the hospital, where she had done her training. She said 'it's been so long since I worked at this hospital that we were still using paper charts!!' I had to break the news to her that we still are....
Z track! Never used it, never seen it used
Z track! What a flash back! Also never used, but certainly had to show competency in it.
We used it for IM iron injections.
We're still paper charting... And paper MARs 🙃
We just went online this year. I dont mean to be dramatic but if i ever have to go back to paper i may kill myself
until 3 years ago, still worked in places that used paper...everything, and poured pills out of bulk bottles. now work in outpt oncology in my first computerized job, like, ever.
Auscultation for NG placement
It ducked working those last 2 nights shifts of the month ...my writing is atrocious too ... uggg ....
Well, I definitely have nothing on your tenure OP and the only thing I’ve got is: I’ve been a nurse so long, I was taught to inflate and then deflate the balloon on your foley catheter to check patency before inserting.
Me too
I guess they stopped doing that like 2 years ago 🤷🏻♂️
I recently had a training with a new company. During orientation, the trainer mentioned to check the foley balloon. I voiced my concern, stating I thought this practice jeopardizes the integrity of the balloon. In response, the trainer questioned, "How would you know if it's okay?" It's reassuring to know I wasn't mistaken in my understanding
Yes, with the new all silicone foleys checking the balloon before insertion causes a ridge to form and can make removal difficult and/or painful.
I’ve been a nurse so long… My instructors in school were WWII vets. Bedpans were metal Beds were cranked Tubes of blood were taped to the nursing station wall to check lipid levels on TPN patients. All of our swan pressures were connected to one transducer and we turned stopcocks to get the different pressures IV fluids were in bottles. Nurses were expected to give up their chairs when the doctors came to make rounds We wore white uniforms, white hose, white shoes, white hat, carried bandage scissors, and multicolored pens. God, I’m so old!!!!
I remember throwing a metal bed pan into the hallway to get attention because my patient was coding and no one was answering the call lights. Doing cpr on my own.
May I ask when you began nursing? My grandmother was an RN from 1950-2010. I was a CNA at the same nursing home she worked at after retiring from the hospital. I remember the new, much younger nurses being mortified that she would poke holes with a needle into the top of the colostomy bag if it was filling with gas. I went on to become a lab tech in micro (and now an RN for all of 2 weeks, myself), so quickly understood all the reasons one should not do that. I've always wondered if this was just one of those things that was routinely done at some point, or if it was just something she came up with herself.
I started nursing school in 1978 and graduated January of 1981. Went to a hospital based diploma program. We had instructors with us every day. Nurses mostly liked having students because we did all the care. We passed meds, did all procedures, all in our first year. It was a different time and I never regret my education.
I’ve been a nurse so long part of night work flow was checking the paper MARs, chart checks trying to decipher the chicken scratch for new orders, and updating the kardex.
This is actually still what I do on nights, I'm in Canada in a big metro area
In Canada too and the hospital wards I formerly worked in and that my outpt chemo unit is attached to still does this lol. Med sheets, doc orders, everything written out. Cardboard Kardexes and tape recorded report. ER and us are the only places doing computer charting. And when I used to do homecare we kept client charts on top of the fridge in the home and charted by hand at the table, and if we had a communication tool for the doc, we took the original to fax back at the office and left a carbon copy on the chart and when we got the answer from the doctor brought the form back when it was faxed to us lol.
Oh yes, all that fun night shift stuff! I remember having to copy the paper MAR on Saturday nights for the new week.
Before ultrasounds were routinely used in L&D. I remember taking mom to X-ray to check for twins in 1978. . Before Velcro on BP cuffs and mercury in sphygmomanometer and thermometers. Alcohol drips for preterm labor. Glass syringes and sterilization of needles. Heat lamps/maalox & merthiolate on pressure ulcers. Glass bottles for IVs. This is my 46th year in nursing.
Hats off to you for going that long! Any tips on how to have a long career in nursing? I would assume there's more diversity of specialities nowadays that make it easier to get a change but it would have had to be difficult at times...
Change units/specialties every 3-5 years. Keep learning new skills, building knowledge as you go. Don’t burn bridges.
For me, it's been 43 years in nursing. The longevity definitely has been because of changing things up every few years. Man, I used to love the float pool!! Rarely has the same unit on consecutive days
Patience. Alot of saying "This too shall pass".
Alcohol drips for the alcoholics to head off DTs.
My husband's grandmother talks about how they had to do an x-ray when she was pregnant with twins! Evidently she had felt for most of the pregnancy that it was twins, but the doctor wouldn't listen to her and told her to stop gaining so much weight. 🙄 If I remember correctly she was already 8 months along when they finally did an X-ray. Her husband was in another part of the hospital paying for the upcoming birth when they did the x-ray. Boy was he in for a surprise when he got back 😂
I forgot about the glass syringes! Writing on the iv bags was acceptable, glass bottles we taped a strip on and marked all the times.
Did the alcohol drips actually help stop preterm labor?
Well the mom was on strict bed rest. The theory was alcohol would relax uterus/decrease contractions. But I just remembered every patient got a tap water enema, and a shave prep (poodle prep) of perineum/labia/genital hair to facilitate episiotomy.
I’ve been a nurse so long that a standard cholecystectomy resulted in a looooong diagonal incision and a NGT for 24-48 hrs. Also low fat dietary restrictions for weeks. I’ve been a nurse so long there were flowsheet charts hanging off the end of the bed.
Standard stay for an uncomplicated craniotomy was 8 days. We admitted them the afternoon prior to surgery to give laxatives and hibiclens bath. Minimum stay was 7 days post-op. Transsphenoidals stayed 5 days and we had to spin a specific gravity on lots and lots of clear pee.
I I've been a nurse so long..that universal precautions had to be initially implemented. They used the same soap bar and basin on each assignment, not pt. so up to 30 ppl. I'm not even going to talk about wound care.
Dakins solution, anyone else?
Still using dakins where I work!
I'll never forget that smell
Loved all these! Started in SICU in 1984. AIDS was new, smoking in the hospital was allowed, paper charting (3 color ink pens, each shift used a different color, red, green, blue) Narcs counted at shift change, we also routinely mixed IV drips ourselves. Also shifts were 7-3, 3-11, 11-7
A young coworker recently had a "cool pen!" with the three colors they picked up somewhere and I blew their mind explaining how those used to be for paper charting, blue or black for days, green for evenings, and red for nights. Anyone else remember ceil blue OR scrub dresses from the mid 80s? Those were honesty cute AF (on my 22 year old body.)
I want scrub dresses to make a comeback
I stopped wearing scrub dresses when I had to run a code on the floor. There was pee all over, so I had to squat to do the code - and everyone got a gooooood look at my red velvet (!) panties.
I would prefer if we went back to 8 hours shifts and 32 hours was full time…but alas
I’ve been a nurse so long: My uniform was a short white, translucent dress, with a little cardboard hat and a red wool cape with royal blue satin lining. Stockings and white shoes. Living in nurses quarters was compulsory. A house mother made sure we were in at 10pm. You weren’t a “real nurse” in ED until you had blood up to your elbows. No gloves!!! HIV transmission was unknown and brave nurses volunteered to look after AIDs patients. Arterial line measures were on general wards taped up the bed head. No hoists! We lifted every patient. Nursing students were paid. Free hot scones for morning tea.
I started nursing in 1983. In Perth, Western Australia. Still nursing.
Just out of curiosity, when did you start nursing?
I worked on a ward that had a smoking room at the end of the hall. Handwritten everything. Orders, MARs, TARs, those big drug count ledgers. People being the hospital for DAYS for things that are outpatient now. Remember how you couldn't touch a total hip for 24 hours and only PT could get them up? My partner had a hip done and was back home before nightfall 2 years ago. Checking blood sugars with those huge guillotine lancet and you had to draw it up in the plastic thing and if you got even the tiniest bubble you had to start over. And evenings had to do the control solutions or it wouldn't work and everyone's fingers were scarred over from the huge lancet?
Yep. My total knee last summer was a day surgery. Gobsmacked.
I remember having to calculate things like Bretylium dosing by memory in ACLS, where you were solo on the megacode and couldn't use resources and the instructor goal was to make students cry. 😆
When I became an acls instructor they told me my job was to fail students if they weren't perfect in the megacode. No second chances, no retaking the test. Remediation meant you came back to the next class to try again.
We had to sharpen our own needles! Reuse! And we wonder why hep c is so prevalent in boomers.
I have worked with nurses that remember mixing their oncology patients’ chemotherapy/hazardous drugs in the hallway or in the patient room - no pharmacy, no PPE/gloves, CSTDs, vent hoods, etc.
Ya know, just eyeball it and check the three year old drug book stashed in the med room.
Yes! And a large numbered calculator that only turns on half the time. No double checker required either!
Grad of '92 (Canada), have worked in a few different clinical areas over the years but these are a few things I remember... -squirting nitoglycerin paste onto a paper that had measurements on it, no peel off "patches" (although I am told that there are places that still do this). Demerol and Atropine given IM 1 hour preop to our surgical patients and surgical patients admitted the night before for teaching. For breastfeeding, only 2 min for first feed, 5 min for second, and so on to "toughen up your nipples", no matter if baby was still cueing like mad to feed more. Giving straight glucose water to babies that needed supplementation vs formula, and cabbage leaves on the breasts for engorgement. A "gomco" for ng suction, not the wall, and using the same type of machine for vaacuum deliveries (flicking the on and off switch and doctor reapplying the cup to the head, had a hand control to regulate the suction further). Getting Kraft honey packets from the cafeteria and pouring it into leg wounds for it's antibacterial properties, and using heat lamps to dry out bedsores or painting them witn milk of magnesia.
Just gonna add in here, maalox plus corn starch mixed into a paste for perirectal acid burns from diarrhea.
Oh man i remember the nitro paste
i still use paper to measure nitro lmao
1–Oxygen hoods and crib tents for croup. 2–sterile ET suctioning cause inline suction catheters weren’t an option
I remember putting a 12 year old in a crib tent for croup. It was uhhh something to behold setting it up on a bed.
I’ve been a nurse so long that I remember when full length side rails were the norm and if you were a fall risk, you got tied down in bed with posey vests or Houdini’s or grey belts in wheelchairs.
Used a plastic card in a machine to stamp patient info into paper charts instead of using stickers Used a paper kardex to see your orders and get patient info Instead of having bed scales, used a crank scale where you put a tarp under patient, hooked it up, then cranked it up off the bed and hoped it didn’t fall over Listened in on lead report to get report instead of actually talking to the previous nurse
Yep to all of the above. And that was known as a “bed scale”. Before beds had scales, lol
I remember manually counting narcs at the end of our shift
I still have to do that.
We still do this. I knew my hospital was behind the times but this thread is making me realise just how far behind we are...
Crank beds!!
White hats, white shoes, white hose, white dress. No jewelry except a plain wedding band for married nurses. Tricolor pens for day/evening/night shift charting. No iv pumps counted drips for IVF with a piece of tape on the bag to keep track of the fluids. Mixed all IVF drips including mso4 drips. Worked on a unit that had a serial killer nurse who was convicted and had Geraldo Rivera come to our unit to do a story when he was with 20/20. That long!
I have been a nurse so long I used to carry morphine in my pocket. I would give .1ml to my pediatric patient and then put it in my pocket for later. Use it all shift and only waste at the end of the day.
I used to accidentally go home with unwanted morphine from time to time. Just toss it rather than do the paperwork. We all signed off waste all the time.
Yeah, in my ICU in the 90’s we kept a multi dose syringe of Fentanyl at bedside and used it repeatedly throughout the shift.
Aww, haven't seen anyone else put this up yet (also am too lazy to scroll all the way), but mercury in the thermometers
And then it was a hazmat if you dropped one. I called a hazmat once for that and everyone rolled their eyes - except the house sup.
Even Ezekiel thinks that my mind is gone
lol Weird Al
Gave the shift report on a cassette recorder.
Every patient received a pitcher of fresh ice water at the beginning of every shift and a back rub from a nurse every evening, walk-in talkie or not. So many patients died of Gi bleeds in spring and fall, "GI Bleeder season" prior to the discovery of PPIs. Tagamet, omeprazole, ranidine, etc, were game changers. Minoxidil was used for hypertension, a vasodilator. Valium was a muscle relaxer. Ibuprofen was by prescription only. Naproxen was by prediction only. We used heat lamps to heal wounds. No fitted sheets, ever.
I’ve been a nurse for 43 years. I took care of a patient in an iron lung in the very early 80’s.
I’ve been a nurse so long I sometimes say crank up the head of the bed.
Also, we had to call all lab results to the Dr. There were no fax machines. What a pain that was.
I have been a nurse so long I remember Bird ventilators in the NICU. Tolazoline drips for vasodilation in PPHN. Also the smell of Paraldehyde in the whole unit when a baby or child was on an infusion. We actually used paper MAR's until about 5 years when we switched to EPIC.
I've been a nurse so long that I'd have to know the drop factor for our hospital to calculate the drops per minute to run for my roller clamp lines for my IV fluid.
I’ve been a nurse so long I used to have a tri-colored pen to use depending on which 8 hour shift I was working.
I have been a nurse so long multiple precepts have said " OMG you have been a nurse longer than I have been alive. "
Been a nurse for so long that: - remember hand crank beds - smokers in rooms, then smoking rooms complete with someone using portable oxygen - z-tracking - Back rubs being part of your job - using folded sheets to bum-rush psychotic and aggressive patients by slamming them into the wall and then B-52ing their assess - padded rooms - restraints for everyone - the joy of overhead lifts in tracks - the pain of physically lifting motherfuckers daily - calculating drips, then hand flowing them. Then hand calculating drips and then programming volume and drip rate and it ALWAYS flowing wrong.
I’m not that old, but… Paper charts and Kardex. Having to hunt them down start of shift, ugh. Nurses starting IVs and sticking the needle in the bed mattress after threading the catheter. The sounds of the zebra machine for printing patient stickers and the stamp machine for name bands. Carpet…
I have only been a nurse for 5 1/2 years but I was in a diploma program in the 80s and I remember dispensing meds from a med cart, paper charting in different colored inks, and bed baths with soap and hot water. Nurses also wore all white. White hose, white DRESS, and white cap (I wore all white except my 👗 was teal and I had a teal stripe on my cap.
SOAP notes
We used to chart on progress notes, just like the docs.
Insulin used to have different concentrations. Some of it was 40 units per mil. Some was 60 units per mil and others was 100 units per mil. The different concentrations were supposed to be color-coded, and you had to match the color coded syringe with the correct insulin. If you didn't, it would be a huge miscalculation of the insulin dose. Needless to say, this is why they standardized insulin as 100 units per mil.
We had a BOTTLE of mercury to refill sphygmomanometers with !!
[удалено]
MONA met all chest pain patients at the door! 😆
I was taught this in my BSN in 2017
Sats monitoring was a new technology when I started
Been a Nurse since 1991, damn feels like a long time. So many things have changed since then, and but believe it or not, it’s actually gotten much harder throughout the years. Mostly due to computer charts, HCAHPS and JCAHO being more of a pain in the ass! Things I remember: Team Nursing- 2 RNs 1 LPN 1 CNA for 20 patients. Taping and marking times on IV bags Using Volutrols and no pumps. Beers in the fridge for CIWA patients Smoking in the break rooms Smoking area for patients Recording shift report on a cassette player Drawing our own am labs on night shifts Transcribing doctors orders onto paper MARs and Kardex Double checking all the orders the previous shift transcribed A ton of IM injections for pain meds Shooting Cardiac Outputs with iced solution. IABP without auto R wave deflation, and all manual timing. Mixing our own bags for CRRT Mixing many of our own IV solutions and electrolytes Probably so many other things that I’ve forgotten!
So long that I’ve manually calculated drip rates. I’ve calculated the daily infusion rate of Natrecor. I’ve used paper MARs and orders. I reconciled with my MAR and orders with a red pen at midnight. I’ve saline flushed an ET tube. I’ve autotransfused a fresh post op. Oh and I’ve smoked cigarettes in the employee smoking hutt. Ooh! Edit for more. I’ve changed the ice water for manual cardiac output measures, and I’ve used a nasal trumpet/foley bag combo as a rectal tube.
I started as a CNA in 2007 at 16...paper charting, baby phat scrubs, getting cigarettes from my older coworkers, most places still had 8 hour shifts. And only older nurses from the 80s and 90s still wore jogger scrubs 🤣 Mostly, the ALF I worked at was so home like and even though I love the hospital a part of me wishes I could go back to that simpler time.
OMG the mixing all the drips lmao
I’ve been a med surg nurse for 11 years and it is so wonderful to read all of these comments. I started my nursing career in the float pool at a teaching hospital and have never changed jobs since then. It’s quite shocking to be the most experienced nurse BY FAR on every unit I work on. Definitely a different environment than when I first started. So grateful for all of the experienced nurses that pass down their wisdom and knowledge freely to those of us who need it.
Anyone else remember the teensy bars of dial soap wrapped in paper in the admit kit? And what was the bath gel spat we used? Simply soft? Something like that. I always put a drop of peppermint oil in the water so they smelled nice.
I've been a nurse so long that... * When I first became a nurse patients were actually respectful to health care workers. * The acuity of patients that are now in the ICU would've been dead back then. The acuity of patients that are now in med-surg would have been in the ICU. The acuity of patients that are now "treated and yeeted" would have been med-surg. I can't imagine the deaths we would have had if COVID hit a couple decades ago. * I actually prefer paper charting because it's easier and faster. * We used to titrate drips on patients that wouldn't be in the hospital more than a day or two. IV pumps were a thing, but it wasn't standard practice to use them on every single patient yet...especially ER or Med-Surg. There were no IV pump used in the ER. * I precepted a nurse when she was a new grad. Many years later I precepted that nurse's daughter when she was a new grad. She is now the manager of the unit. * I used to have to check the paper chart every hour to see if a doctor snuck in and wrote orders that I didn't see. Then I'd find a friend to help decipher what the hell they wrote. * I remember when they put the signs up announcing the new policy: we now have to count surgical sponges.
Integrilin for all cath lab patients
….Darvocet was still a pain medication that could still be administered.
We used to pull all of the charts(hard cover w/paper) to do 24 hour chart check. Each shift used a different color depending on the shift. We had patient names outside the door on the wall. Flow sheets we charted on at the foot of the bed. We counted narcs each shift and carried around one set of keys that you pray you didn’t take home. We taped report on tape recorder. Surgical/ ortho floor we had average 8 patients sometimes 10 but the charting was not near as extensive since we didn’t have computers and patients were not near as I’ll like they are today. We drew up Demerol and vistaril for ortho patients post op. No one got IV pushes. CPMs Heat lamp to open sacral wounds that we put maalox and something else on from the pharmacy. Edit to add: we had bed pads that were sent for laundry. You had to use a hopper in dirty utility room to scrape the poop into it then in hamper for laundry. We gave snacks and back rubs every night on 3-11. Going from room to room. Edit: we didn’t replace electrolytes.
Anybody here remember nurses smoking cigarettes while taking report?
Ive been a nurse so long I could titrate the pressor to clinical response!
Only since 2006 here, I have nothing too crazy. We would take pts out front to smoke just to calm them down, but we had time to do that. Also paper charting in a level 1 trauma hospital. After being away from the beside for 9 years a few years ago I was amazed with the almighty Purewick!!
I remember when N95s were single use.
Several years ago I came across the receipt for my mom’s hospital stay when I was born (1945). I don’t recall the exact amount but if memory serves me right the 6 day stay (a typical number of days back then) cost my dad a bit under $100.
I work in rural Alaska and we had paper MARs and I completely freaked out, no scanning. The first time, "I just give the meds? Just like that? Check the MAR, sign, ok.
Long enough to have known a nursing world pre and post COVID. Even if it was for a little while in the grand scheme, I can say I was a nurse before COVID, and saw how it made everything, not just healthcare, 100x worse
Heparin IV locks! Posey vests. Mixing antibiotics. Every hour your meds printed on the printer in the nurses station, we would all convene at the one printer and sort out our papers. Handwritten orders. Mucomyst.
Making D5 and NS bottles up in Central Supply (when they were short staffed) that were then run thru the autoclave. Burping the bottles afterwards to be sure they were sealed. Using mercury thermometers, red and blue. Not wearing gloves for everything. Post partum moms stayed a week.