After my first week and first impressions of this department, I felt pretty good about the time I will be spending here in Tyler. After my second week, I have a few concerns that I didn’t see coming last week!
Travel nursing is difficult! I tend to feature all the best parts of travel nursing on my blog and deal with the difficulties more privately because Travel Nursing truly is what you make of it. I have highlighted some of my struggles in previous blogs, especially in Contract #1 and Contract #6, but I don’t want to over shadow all the amazing things I get to do and experience by complaining or venting about the downfalls of the job.
But, the longer I do this, the more drawn I am to write about the realities of what I do.
So, if you know me personally, like following my adventures, or if you are considering the change to travel nursing… Here are a few things to think about and some of the difficulties that come along with the job!
For reference, I work in a procedural department that does overnight call hours. This means, I not only have to be proficient in multiple procedures, be able to perform these procedures in both the Nurse and Tech role, and also know and work with many different physicians while adapting my knowledge to accommodate their individual preferences for each type of procedure.
As a Travel Nurse, orientation and training for EMR’s (electronic medical records), MD preferences, and the flow of the department is 1 shift. You are expected to know your specialty fully and without question!
Advanced Procedures
I have always been upfront in my interviews about what I procedures I consider myself proficient at and what procedures I haven’t seen or done in the past. Up to this point, I have never had to do an unfamiliar procedure during call hours when I had no resources if questions or complications arose.
This current hospital does numerous “advanced” procedures that I have never done or seen in the past! Advanced procedures require more equipment and devices as well as knowledge and understanding of how they work and how to use them. I am not being “trained” to perform these advanced cases but will be expected to perform the role as Nurse/Tech with proficiency when assigned to the “advanced” room for the day or when placed on call.
Hospital Navigation
If you have ever been in any hospital, you know that they are a maze of long hallways, elevators, and towers. Finding your way around a hospital is a constant struggle of asking for directions, following limited signage, and questioning every left/right turn! Now, imagine justing started at a hospital 1 week ago and being told to go pick up a patient on TD454…
I am lucky to make it from the employee parking to my department without getting lost and you are asking me to do what?? Pick up a patient by myself with some half @$$ directions to go “here and take the elevators to 4th floor, follow the signs”? I’m following the signs to what exactly and how do I get to “here”? It is a nightmare trying to navigate a new hospital. Just imagine me pushing a 100 lb hospital bed with a patient in it that is getting more concerned by the minute because the one person in charge of their care is asking them for directions!! (reality right here)
Communication
We all have that one Doctor that we can not, for the life of us, understand what they are saying! It can be anything from a Doctor who is soft spoken to someone with a thick accent, add a mask on top of that and some very loud ambient noice in the background and I am sorry, but I understood none of that order you just called out! Somehow, though, you do start to understand them with time. Either you start to speak their language or you just know what they are going to ask for because you have been working together for so long. As a travel nurse, good luck not pissing a Doctor off by saying “can you repeat that…. ok, just spell that cause I still didn’t understand”. By the time I start to learn a doctors common orders, dialect, and preferences, my contract is over.
Access
We all know the struggle of getting badge access to all the required doors and elevators, but also access to the drug machines, glucose monitors, EMR, and Time Clocks! TIME CLOCKS!! If nothing else works, that’s fine… but I’m gonna get paid for this torture!! When you can’t get into the time clock for 2 weeks, its a bit concerning… when the manager doesn’t see you on her employee list, you start to questions whose running this show!
This list could go on, but I think you might get the point… “Hang on tight and figure it out” is the story of my life!
In non-travel nurse news: this week I reunited with Darth Vader and visited the local indoor archery range! This bow and its poundage kicked my butt… after 30 arrows and 5 hours later- I decided to take a trip home to wake up The Black Pearl. The Pearl is a lower poundage bow and it also has 12 arrows to match. Sometime this week, I will take The Pearl out of retirement and see if I can shoot 30 arrows in 2 hours! Life goals are important!
Keep following along on this crazy amazing Travel Nurse adventure and see if this retired World Archer can become the Comeback Kid!
