Nurse

If you enjoy caring for others, are extremely organized, and have an interest
in health and medicine, this may be your dream career. Nurses help to
preserve and protect the health of patients and the well-being of healthcare
facilities to which patients go for medical attention.

Nurses must be totally reliable; everyone in a healthcare setting depends

upon them in many ways. Doctors need them to assist with preparations and
details involved in running medical offices, clinics and hospitals. Nurses are
also the first to deal with all kinds of patients. They comfort the sick, support
the recovering, and inform the healthy about protecting themselves against
illness and injury. Because their jobs can be emotionally and physically
strenuous, the best nurses are compassionate, patient and cool under
pressure.

Top Ten
Ten(der) Loving Ca regivers
There are more types of nurses than there are medical specialties. This is
because nurses specialize according to many criteria: type of patient illness,
stage of patient recovery, administrative function, technical training, and
more. Nurses attain varying levels of responsibility based on their specialized
education. Here are ten ways in which nurses work at comfort and care.

ADMINISTRATOR:
Nurse administrators are supervisors or managers who guide the many
healthcare workers that affect patients. Administrators also make the rules of
conduct, plan budgets, and work with other leaders in hospitals and
healthcare facilities. They oversee an entire organization, ensuring that it runs
well for patients and healthcare workers alike.

FLIGHT:
Flight nurses are specially trained in emergency care and fly in helicopters to
places where people have been injured and need immediate attention. These
nurses often work for hospitals where they await the calls that direct them to

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people in need. Like most emergency medical team members, these nurses
focus on keeping patients in “stable condition” until they are able to reach a
hospital.

INFORMATICS:
Informatics nurses are relatively new on the nursing scene. These nurses do
not work directly with patients but use their knowledge to help others
understand the work that nurses perform and to process the information that
nurses manage and gather. Informatics nurses generally work in hospitals
translating medical information into computer programs so information can be
shared, tracked, preserved, and studied. Keeping accurate and organized
medical records is critically important to maintaining and improving patient
health.

INTENSIVE CARE:
Severe injuries or illnesses, such as extensive burns, heart conditions,
premature births, or major surgeries, can require round-the-clock patient care
and supervision from intensive-care nurses. These nurses have special
knowledge, training and skill with advanced medical equipment to keep their
extremely weakened patients’ conditions stable or improving. They are
responsible for tracking their patients’ vital signs (such as temperature, pulse,
breathing, and blood pressure), maintaining their fluid intake, recording their
digestive progress, distributing their medications, and monitoring their
consciousness level (awake, alert, drowsy, or unconscious).

LABOR:
Labor or delivery nurses work in hospital maternity wards assisting mothers
and babies both during and after the birth. Before labor they are responsible
for ensuring that the delivery room is stocked with all the tools that may be
needed. During labor they check the mother’s blood pressure, heart rate and
contractions, and coach her on how to breath and when to push. They track
the unborn baby’s heart rate, movement and position in the birth canal, and
assist the doctor with any complications that may arise. After delivery, these
nurses care for both the baby and mother until they leave the hospital or are
moved to a recovery room.

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PEACE CO RP S:
Peace Corps nurses travel to developing nations to deliver medicine and
health knowledge to local residents. These nurses commit to a two-year stay
in their assigned location and learn to speak the language of the country in
which they work. They teach mothers how to keep their children healthy,
administer vaccinations against common diseases, and provide and teach
others to provide first aid. They train families to care for sick relatives, teach
health courses, set up and run clinics, and try to locate and combat health
risks found in the area.

PEDIATRIC:
Pediatric nurses specialize in the care of children, from babies to teenagers.
Because the human body changes as it develops and ages, pediatric medicine
is a specialty that requires specific knowledge and training. These nurses give
kids their scheduled shots (vaccinations) for protection against common
illnesses, track growth and development, and teach parents how to care for
sick kids and keep families living healthy lives.

PUBLIC HEALTH:
A public-health nurse’s work focuses on the health of hundreds or thousands
of people in a given community. Some public-health nurses work on
government-sponsored projects, helping to develop public health policies.
Public-health nurses provide information about healthful living in the home, at
shelters, in schools, and at public health clinics. They instruct the public about
care between doctor visits, what to do in case problems arise, and about
continuing care for those living with long-term and lifelong illnesses.

REHABILITATION:
Rehabilitation nurses care for those no longer in grave danger but who have
suffered an injury or illness and face long-term recoveries. Because
rehabilitation can be ongoing, “rehab” nurses often work in private homes with
patients who have been released from the hospital. They work to restore
patients to the best possible mental and physical health.

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Because their patients are often depressed about new disabilities, these
nurses work to help patients to want to get as well as possible and to prevent
new health problems from arising. They deliver humor, encouragement and
friendship along with health care.

RE SEARCHE R:
Nurse researchers gather healthcare information in hopes of improving the
care that nurses give, resulting in happier patients and more satisfied workers.
Nurse researchers work in nursing colleges, hospitals and clinics, establishing
useful health vocabulary for caregivers and patients, noticing health hazards
and fixing them, finding the most powerful and comfortable treatmentsm and
reviewing nursing shift standards. They’re more likely to work with other
nurses than with patients.

How to Get Ther e

Take Ca re

• Keep yourself well. A career in nursing starts with maintaining optimal

conditions for healthy growth. Maintain your own health by attending to
your own hygiene – keeping yourself clean and your living spaces
sanitized and organized.
• Know yourself. Be honest with yourself about how much patience you
have for others. Do you like working with children? Are you good at
assisting an elderly relative? Do you like being in charge of someone
else’s care? All of these questions can help you determine whether or
not you could be good at both following orders and protecting another
person’s wellbeing.
• Care for another living being. Ask your parent or teacher to help you
grow a plant. If you have a pet, participate in caring for its feeding,
grooming and healthcare.
• Pay close attention in your science classes; no nurse ever became one
without studying anatomy, chemistry and biology.
• Volunteer! There are plenty of opportunities at hospitals and nursing
homes for young people to help out.

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 You’ll learn more about healthcare in the places where it happens every
day than you will from reading your science books.
• Have a teacher, guidance counselor, relative or clergyperson help
connect you to nurses practicing in doctors’ offices and hospitals. You
may be able to meet and talk with real nurses, which will help you figure
out if this career is for you.
• Search it out. If you have access to the Internet, find out more about the
body and health by searching with the keywords: KIDS’ HEALTH, KIDS’
ANATOMY, KIDS’ SCIENCE, KIDS’ CHEMISTRY and KIDS’ BIOLOGY.

Activity
Armed With History
Whenever a patient seeks medical attention, a nurse’s first step is to
document the patient’s medical history. Reviewing a patient’s medical history
allows caregivers to rule out or relate possible causes by gaining awareness
of existing conditions and medications, as well as family medical conditions.
Find a trusted adult and sit down together with a piece of paper and pencil.
(You can do this with a friend, but working with an adult may be more fun
because the average adult has a longer and more interesting medical history
than the average young person.)

Basic Information:

• Name:
• Date of Birth:
• Age:
• Gender:
• Marital Status: Married | Divorced | Single
• Children:
o How Many?
• Emergency Contact:
• Medical Information:
• Any known allergies?
• Any past surgeries? When?
• Any existing illnesses or injuries? Starting when?

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 • Are you taking any medication currently? For what?
• When was your last physical?
• Are you a smoker?
o If so, starting when?
o How many cigarettes per day?
• Do you have any symptoms or health complaints? Any recurrent
problems? For example, do you suffer from headaches, earaches,
nosebleeds, etc?
• Family History:
• Any known allergies in your family?
• Any known illness or death due to illness in your family?
• Parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents?
• Any major surgeries among your immediate family?
• Any smokers in your home?
• Anyone taking regular medication? For what?
• Any recurrent problems in your immediate family?

Feel free to add your own questions to better understand your patient’s
medical history. When you’re done, go through the answers and figure out
how you can provide them with custom medical assistance if needed.

For example:

• If his/her appendix was removed already, appendicitis can be ruled out

as a cause for abdominal pain, right?

Can you take your own medical history?

Q&A
Q. Can y ou des cribe y our a ve ra ge workda y?

Hannah K., who has been a nurse in New York City for three years, says:

My nursing shift starts at 8:30 a.m. with “report.” During “report,” the night
shift shares information on each and every patient. Usually, I’m assigned to
care for 10 to 13 patients a day. Sometimes, I am put “in charge,” overseeing

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patient care and helping nurses throughout the floor of the hospital where I
work.

Medication time starts at 9:00 a.m. Many medicines have to be given with
meals. So, we have to get through report and get out onto the floor by 9:00,
in order to get the medications out.

Morning is also busy with cleaning patients and changing their beds. This is
often a task that requires two to three helpers. People who are “completes”
have to be lifted up with a machine called a Hoyer lift. Sometimes we can “log
roll” them. Patients either have to be turned every two hours or have to be
lifted into chairs.

Sometime after noon, we start getting lab work back. Lab results tell us if we
need to order anything for the patients, like blood transfusions or
supplements like potassium. Nurses have to make sure that doctors are aware
of any abnormal lab results. Checking all the lab work on 13 patients is
detailed work and, because it can mean the difference in someone’s health,
mistakes are unacceptable.

Another medication time occurs at 2:00 p.m. Intravenous bags delivering

constant fluids and medicine directly into patients’ veins all need to be
changed. Then the nurses start getting patients back into bed in preparation
for the evening shift.

There are other responsibilities that nurses keep in mind while performing all
their shift duties, like watching vents, suctioning, wound care, and more.

Between 2:00 and 4:00 p.m., nurses continue to give medications, bloods and
supplements to their patients. Often nurses need to draw more blood or take
other kinds of specimens. Families are attended to and patients are often
cleaned again.

By 4:00 p.m., we’re supposed to have taped day reports for the evening
nurses using tape recorders. Often, it is impossible to find the time to “tape
report,” so instead we give an “oral report” when the new staffers arrive.

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After “report” is given and the new shift is on, we record nursing notes in
every patient’s chart. Where I work, notes have to be both typed into the
computer and written. So, at some point before 2:00 p.m., the notes are
entered into the computer. Then at the end of the day, updates are written in
the chart. Notes are comprehensive, containing every detail from how much a
patient ate at each meal, to how many feet a patient was able to walk and
with how much help.

At 5:00 p.m. I’m done for the day and I can hardly believe it’s over. There is
so much to do during the day that we hardly notice the time pass. I think it’s
some of the toughest work around, but it’s also some of the most gratifying.

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