I had a realization the other day. I guess it was nice, since I am a new nurse, quote on quote. I arrived to my shift and immediately I was running around with my hemmorraging pt. trying to keep him from getting hypotensive. While I was tranfusing God knows how many units of blood, giving fluids, etc, the back of my mind could not help but run with thoughts of "Oh God, Im so behind on my charting" :I've made no notes..etc" Then as the night slowed down a bit, and as my patient quickly recovered and was thanking me for treating her so well and making her feel better, I realized that there is always time for charting, but there is never enough time for your patient. Charting will eventually fall into place and your patient won't if you dont attend to him.

It was a nice feeling.
<3 B.love

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B.love

Hmmm.... on some level you are correct...and since you're a new nurse I'm going to give you the Pollyanna concept and say kudos to you.....BUT.....charting saves your butt in a court of law....so you can CONTINUE to spend time with your patients because you charted well enough to keep your license.

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www.MyOwnWoman.blogspot.com

True to your comment MyOwnWoman, but also - b.love is right. Charting can wait until later if you are in the middle of some major care for a patient. I'm usually a huge proponent of charting as you go and train all my new nurses to do so, but there are also times where it just has to wait because I'm to busy pushing cardiac drugs or assisting with chest tube placement followed by catheter placement followed by blah blah blah.

Sometimes charting just has to wait. Just not all the time.

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Julie

My Blog ER RN

I agree Polaris.....it's a fine line we walk.

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www.MyOwnWoman.blogspot.com