Hi Gen!!! How exciting that you are coming back to the states! Australia's loss is our gain! Ironically, I would love to visit Australia - as a working volunteer at Roo Gully (a wildlife sanctuary). I'd like to know more about what it was like to work as a medical liaison for the medical device company and clinical teacher. Did you need any special education?

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The ER is the only place where you are rewarded for efficiency by getting more patients!

Kim
http://www.emergiblog.com

I am a new RN. I just passed my boards! I finished a BSN program in May. I have a job in a PICU (pediatric intensive care unit) in an urban hosptial which also does a lot of research. Our patient population is mostly medicaid/medi-cal and illegal immigrants and the uninsured. I enjoy it though, because they are a totally underserved population and since we have reserach dollars, we get to treat them with excellent care.

I did my preceptorship where I am currently employed, so I have been there since February. RSV season in a PICU is nuts!! Those were my first days!!! It should be less crazy this summer, since we mostly get trauma and otherwise it is pretty slow.

So far I love nursing. I love patients and families and I love my role. When I first started nursing school I thought I was just doing because I didnt have the chops for medical school. Boy was I surprised. For one... nursing school is HARD and two... I would never want to be a physician. I love my one or two patients who I have for days on end and make a real relationship with, rather than seeing twenty of them a day and not examining them because I got a good report from my RN.

We are the backbone of healthcare.

Hello everyone! My name is Nicole (Elocin is my name spelled backwards, and as my dad says, my "Evil Twin"!). I am a nurse in a 21 bed critical care unit. We take primarily medical & surgical pt's, open hearts, etc., minimal traumas.

I've been a nurse for two years, and was a nurse's aide for five of seven years off and on in high school and college. I love my job and my co-workers. I am beginning some research on developing a palliative care team for the unit that will hopefully branch out to the rest of the hospital in the future. I am SOOOOO excited about it! If anyone has any tips or ideas I would love them.

Welcome aboard, Nicole. It's good that you have so much enthusiasm for your job. We need more nurses like you in the profession. Thanks for stopping by Nursing Voices. I really look forward to reading your posts.

MJ

Hi Nicole,

It would help to hire a nurse or nurse practitioner who specializes in palliative care.

Hiring a doctor who does the same helps, too.

Having the personnel who have experience with this helps when it comes time to start writing policies and procedures.

I've found that most docs are more than happy to have us call the palliative care nurse to come and talk to the family.

Our hospital also has a palliative care/pain committee that meets that discusses new ways of helping patients/families cope with end of life issues as well as controlling pain.

Just a few ideas

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I finally made it! Glad to see you all. For those who don't know me, I've been a nurse for 10 years. I've worked in telemetry, ER, OR, PICU and for the last 3 years as a transplant coordinator (I know, I get around). Mostly worked in ER and transplant.

However, I am going back to the PICU in 3 weeks...better hours, better pay, happier family. I love the PICU and I can't wait to start. I still love transplant though and my dream job would be a position as a pediatric liver transplant coordinator. So far, none of those in NJ-we send our liver kids to Philly or NYC. Oh, well.

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Susan

Quote:

There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle. Albert Einstein

http://www.donorcycle.blogspot.com/

Thanks for the welcome!

Well, how it happened was that I was working in a cardiothoracic transplant ICU, and our hospital helped the company test the new ventricular assist device (our nurses helped look after the sheep implants during animal testing etc at our animal facility).

We then did the first human implant in 2003, and I happened to look after the patient a lot, and loved VADs so the device became my baby. I was a clinical nurse specialist, so my "portfolio" for ward education was devices, and I put together the learning package about this device. A lot of the company staff (director, chief scientific officer etc) were present at the bedside to see how this first patient did, and I got to know them.

I asked how they were going to train nurses at other hospitals when they expanded the trial, and jokingly said "hey, you should hire me!". They did! So I moved 500 miles away to Sydney, where I've been for the past 4 years.

I started out as a clinical teacher - wrote the instruction manuals, set up hospital and surgeon training, ran the animal implants, lots of travel to conferences, writing papers, a LOT of writing powerpoint presentations and delivering them.. over and over and over. Attended all implants to advise on how to put it in, because the surgeons never listened at training and always thought they had a better way to do it (!!). I then became the manager of that department, and hired a bunch of nurses from my old ICU who were great. I then moved across to medical affairs, where I got to have input into trial design, writing journal articles etc. I got to live in the US for a year to set up our trial there, which was cool as that's where I met the people I'm now going to work for/with!

A lot of the training was on the job training from the device engineers about troubleshooting, you really had to learn the electrical stuff in detail as there were always smart arse doctors who felt the need to see if you knew the answers to some tricky question... not minding no life, long on-call, lots of travel, being considered "a rep" (even when you're not selling anything!) and ability to cope with corporate life. I also did a course in adult education, and am currently completing my masters.

I loved the people, the job and the device - in my few years there, we went from having 5 implanted patients in one Aussie hospital to having 125 in 7 countries!!

In the end the corporate thing got to me. My new CEO was an asshole, and I couldn't pretend he wasn't. It just became depressing working for him, so I left.

I had a ball working in the US, and have a sister living there and some friends as well, so I can't wait to come back.

I love animals as well, I haven't heard of the Roo place you mentioned, but there are lots of wildlife sanctuaries, also you can volunteer for WIRES (google it) - which means you take in baby wild animals when their mothers are hit by cars, etc. Very interesting. I volunteered at the humane shelter in Pittsburgh, and was a foster mum for lots of baby kitties, I loved it!!

Wow, so that was an essay, I got to do some housework!
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Holy cow, I have GOT to get out into the blogosphere more. I spend so much time writing I have no time for reading!!! Congrats on the PICU position (and welcome to Nursing Voices, have to do my "official" moderator hello! )

Now I have to get my bad self to your blog and catch up!!!!

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The ER is the only place where you are rewarded for efficiency by getting more patients!

Kim
http://www.emergiblog.com

Gen! That is a fantastic story - you were in the right place at the right time with the right enthusiasm...wow! You've had a literal world-wide career!

__________________
The ER is the only place where you are rewarded for efficiency by getting more patients!

Kim
http://www.emergiblog.com

Wow, you're leaving transplant? Have we finally found our pediatric nurse blogger? :-) LOL

Good luck Susan!

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