My Reflection On Field Placement

For todays clinical, I was located at the office in Pineville. To start the day, Mrs. Faranda went over the computer system and planned out her day based on her goals set for each patient. She planned out which patients she would need to call first. After that, she showed me how to look and see which patients were in the hospital and which were located in the emergency department. Lastly she me different thing in the computer system like the social determinants of health and the medication system. She also went over resources. To end the day, she made a few phone calls and tired to reach out to certain patients. Overall, I enjoyed my day and being able to learn more about Community Care of North Carolina.

During week one meet with staff and providers to discuss the research that supports my change project. Also, randomly talking with patients to get their input and what they feel would meet their learning needs. Meeting with the stakeholders from my clinic. Reaching out to the IT department and meeting with the finance department.

It is important to provide a welcome and supportive environment as the individual is likely to be feeling anxious and scared about the new environment and the new people they will be meeting. Staff and service users should provide a relaxed environment and ensure they are not overcrowding the individual or throwing to much information at them all at once.

Prior to walking in, my expectations for what I was about to partake in and experience were all over the place. I didn’t know whether to expect the absolute worst types of situations going on such as people being rushed into medical rooms or the most basic situations such as patients waiting for a strep throat test. I did expect to see a wide range of patients in terms of race, class, age, and gender. Contrary to the patients, I didn’t expect to see a wide range of race, class, age, and gender within the staff. I expected to see mostly female nurses, and male doctors, majority being Caucasian and middle age. I didn’t expect there to be that much security or any type of possible crime that could go on within a medical facility. I expected the waiting area and facility to be very large, large enough to accommodate a lot of patients at once. Lastly, I expected that taking our field notes would be a challenge because writing notes down in front of patients would be awkward and during interviews it would be hard to conduct a good interview while writing the whole time.

Week eight was the same as always. I began the day at eight in the morning to receive patients, print out superbills and doing the usual. I will soon be I find my clinic a bit repetitive, but I like it because I learn by repetition. As I was taking in patients a woman told me her son had the Flu. Her son is believed to have type b, or category B

Primary, as a counselor, they have to track daily notes and document everything; then they will have a team meeting to make sure they are on the same page. The reason why you have to document everything is because if you did not document, then it never happened. Supervisors will evaluate counselors’ performances, and Navy will make sure counselors did their paperwork correctly, and also there is a survey for clients to evaluate their helpers. In addition, record make sure staffs’ skills are developing, they have training twice a week, and since this hospital is a teaching hospital, Bob is also training his two interns every day.

The orientation process for new hires lasts six weeks. The new nurse attends nursing orientation for one week and then is assign a preceptor on the unit for each shift. The DPCS introduces the new employee to their preceptor. This nurse works three weeks on the day shift, one week on the evening shift and one week on the night shift working with both medically acute rehabilitation patients and surgical patients. Nurses receive extra days of their orientation with patients that the nurse has limited clinical experience such as a nurse with postoperative experience will work more with the medically acute rehabilitation patients to practice new skills. For new graduates their orientation is individualize and can last from 8-16 weeks.

My overall experience at Arlington Place was great. As mentioned this was a new environment and focus group. At the start of my learning-service, I struggled to communicate in a pitch/tone in which the residents were able to hear because I am really quiet and shy. Before working at Arlington Place, I have not experienced someone with dementia. This was something new to me and I was nervous that I would make them feel uncomfortable. I first struggled to follow a conversation with a resident in particular because of how severe her dementia was. I have to admit; I was getting a little annoyed by the repetition of our conversation. The longer I was surrounded by this type of environment the faster I learned how to deal with certain situations.

Throughout the second half of the semester, I have not made any significant changes to my pre-clinical routine. I still prepare and gather my supplies the evening beforehand, and I try to avoid during schoolwork in order to facilitate restful sleep. However, upon arriving to the unit, I have developed a familiarity with the staff and environment that has reduced my stress and anxiety levels, allowing me to focus more attention on my patient assignment for the day. Although we do not have assigned preceptors, I have developed a mentoring relationship with two of the nurses on the unit and will work with those staff members if available. As we have gotten to know and trust one another, we do not have to spend the first part of our shift familiarizing ourselves,

Experience: The first day is bound to be nerve wrecking, but I dealt with my nerves effortlessly and quickly. Even though the tasks I did were simple, I had fun filling out the papers and doing my job. Every now and then, one needs to step out of their comfort zone and do things other than routine tasks (work and homework), it is imperative to get fresh air.

A typical day consists of arriving at work at nine in the morning at the latest. First she will go to her computer, and look at the census of all the patients. She figures out if there are any new patients since she left the previous day and go over who came in the night before. Then she has to know whose social assessment needs to be done because they need to be done seventy-two hours within the patient’s admission. She usually will keep notes on her desk on what needs to be done. Most days, she calls homeless shelters because some patients have to go there after they are discharged. If she is not calling a homeless shelter, there is always another place or family to call for patients. She attends a team meeting every day at eleven in the morning to talk about their patients and the best way of handling their situations. She meets with her patients and will do their social assessment. They talk about how they feel about going home or going to a homeless shelter. Some days she does family sessions in addition. Everyone being discharged needs a psychologist and a therapist, so she must make sure that happens as well. She does not have a lot of control about what job she will be doing during the day. Overall,

The first year working as a RN was especially difficult. I started out on a medical-surgical unit with an oncology focus. I felt overwhelmed much of the time, but thankfully I was surrounded by experienced nurses. All of my coworkers on that unit had at least eight years of experience and so I was able to go to them for advice and guidance regarding the issues with which I was struggling. My advice to new nurses is to know their resources and ask the experienced nurses on the floor for help.

I had to understand the circumstances in which people were in and how interact with residents respectfully and compassionately which provided opportunities for personal growth by practicing integrity, justice and good stewardship. Though I was a bit hesitant, my experience has been very positive. Just being a volunteer without any related experience or skills, I was unqualified to help and many ways. The few menial tasks that I was able to do seemed to be met with much enthusiasm and appreciation. Simply helping someone to their seat bringing them a cup of tea or

The second week of my preceptorship brought many new experiences for me, and I can honestly say that each day I spend with my preceptor is better than the last. This week I focused on time management of a full patient load with continued documentation practice as well as admission and discharge procedures. I’ve had brief experiences in my past rotations assisting with discharge teaching and admission assessments however I have never been able to fully take charge and complete the process from start to finish, so this was a great learning opportunity for me.

My four weeks of clinical placement had thought me lots of things that can help me to become a better nurse in the future. I give my outmost respect and thanks to my clinical preceptors to the learning and knowledge they have imparted. I have learned a lot from clinical placement because 2B ward is a surgical unit I came to understand the complexity of wound care. Every wound should be assessed according to its type and severity because every type of wound has its appropriate dressing. Aside from learning clinical procedure such as wound dressing, drug administration (within scope of practice), naso-gastric feeding and etc, I came to learn the importance of teamwork it makes the job easier and allows good communication within staff members of the ward. I am looking forward for my upcoming clinical placement in 3rd year to gain more knowledge in and experience to develop my nursing skills and become a competent nurse in the future.