Fepic Students!

This week I feel fepic (that’s effing epic for those of you who don’t know). 

I don’t know if any of you reader’s have missed me, but I’ve been so busy with the new challenging placements, I have been neglecting you. So last week I thought it must be about time Charisma at the nursing agency gave me a break. 

As luck would have it she was able to book me in for a couple of lovely days at Sunshine Retirement Village, my old stomping ground. It was lovely to see the girls again and some of the residents even said that they had missed me! 

When I got there, I was called in to see the Manager. I was a bit nervous, I’d only just got through the door so I couldn’t have done anything wrong – yet. 

It turned out that she’d been working with the local uni and had agreed to take some ‘specially selected’ student nurses on placement and that a new one was due to start later that morning. 

She went on to tell me that the last one hadn’t worked out and that she’d had to send him packing. The uni hadn’t been impressed but she had dug her heels in and said they didn’t have anyone there who could handle him when he hadn’t taken his meds and anyway, she couldn’t always guarantee he could have Wednesday afternoon off while he attended the depot clinic. She had a bit of a haunted look on her face when she was telling me all this and I’m sure her left eye was twitching, so I figured I was getting the watered down version!

Anyway, I was to wait for the student to arrive and look after her. Teach her what I could as the most senior nurse on duty. I didn’t point out that I was the only nurse on duty!

Just as I finished the meds, my student turned up. I took one look at her and knew I had my work cut out -  if I didn’t glue her to my side, these carers would eat her for breakfast. She was tall and willowy and she reminded me of Bambi with her huge (horrified) eyes. She had a pristine white tunic on and her hair flowed endlessly down her shoulders and back.

Dee the senior came round the corner at that point and got to her before I did. I was too far away to save the poor girl, so I had to let it pan out and pick the pieces up. Dee barked at her that she was late and to be fair to the girl, she took it on the chin. Said that she was awfully sorry, but it had taken her a little longer to put her face on that morning as she had been out with Mummy and Daddy for dinner the night before.

The look on Dee’s face made me splutter. She eyed the newbie like she’d just fallen off another planet and then ordered her to tie her hair up and then report to me. She glided (yes glided) across to me and offered me her dainty, beautifully manicured hand to shake. Turns out her name was Elise. When I introduced her to Mrs G, she said that Elise’s mum clearly couldn’t spell and that she would call her by her proper name – Elsie! 

By the end of the shift she was fondly known as Elsie to everyone. 

Elsie was a rich kid from London and was a second year student. Her Dad had made his money in property and had tried to persuade her to join the family business. With a determined look on her face, she told me that she’d always wanted to be a nurse and that she was following her dream. Her Dad had cut most of her allowances so she was experiencing student life to the full – and loving it!

We spent the day working through the nurses duties in a care home. To be honest, I’d forgotten there was so much to learn as it’s something I kind of do automatically now and that worries me a bit. I don’t want to be the kind of nurse who doesn’t think about what she’s doing – that’s when complacency sets in and mistakes are made. 

The rest of the team were wary of Elise/Elsie to begin with. They’d figured out straight away that she was ‘different’ and went in for the kill. I said it was important that she understood what the care role was like as this would help her leadership skills, so I let them loose with her for a couple of hours. They gave her all the crap jobs; cleaning the commodes, taking Mr B out for a cigarette (only a crap job when he aimed his phlegm at your shoes) and listening to Mrs D’s family complain yet again about having to provide Mrs D with toiletries (does she have to have a shower quite so often?). To be fair, she took on every challenge with a smile on her face and the team knew they weren’t going to break her. By the end of the two hours, they were inviting her out and I intervened before it went that far – I’ve been on one of their night’s out – never again. 

I wrestled her off the carers much to their disgust. They had quite liked having an extra pair of hands that morning but she was there to learn. They’d squeezed enough cheap labour out of the poor girl and they wanted more. I put my foot down though and spent the rest of the day going through nursey stuff. 

I had loads of care plans to review so we started with the nursing process. I asked her if she had heard of ‘APIE’ and she told me she had never had a pie in her life. She couldn’t understand why anyone would want to eat all that fat and carbs. I took a deep breath and told her about Assessment, Planning, Implementation and Evaluation  - the nursing process – it took a few minutes but the penny soon dropped! 

After that, we checked the new cycle of meds in then managed a bit of stoma care. We gave Mrs G a bladder washout and then looked at Mr B’s venous leg ulcers. We dressed them together and I tried the full-on health promotion bit with Mr B and encouraged him to cut down on his smoking. He told me to bugger off and then demanded Elsie take him outside for another cigarette. 

At the end of the shift, I encouraged Elise to lead the handover with me just pitching in and filling in a few gaps. She did a great job and left her notes for the team in her beautiful flowing handwriting. When we left she said that she’d had a ‘fepic’ day and that she hoped one day to be just like me! 

After clarifying fepic for me, I decided that she did actually remind me of me when I was starting out. 

She’d just have to learn to love a few pies if she was going to make it a reality!