As an RN myself I completely agree with you on this.
I read on Pham’s bio that she graduated from nursing school and went directly into critical care nursing. When I graduated from nursing school, this rarely happened and was discouraged. It was believed that a new nurse needed experience on general medical surgical floors gaining experience before being considered for a position on a critical care floor. The things you learn on a general med surg floor are building blocks for patients that have more demanding care needs.
A new nurse is just not going to have enough practice and experience to deal with such complex patients. For example, on a general med/surg floor she might have practiced donning PPE for a MRSA patient who was under contact precautions. Here she (hopefully) would practice taking on and off equipment that she needed to protect herself...but without the risk of dying from Ebola.
Again, you are 100 percent correct on this issue. The reason why hospitals are putting green nurses in over their heads? They can pay them less.
Thanks for your response. My grandmother was a nurse and I learned a great deal from her. Thanks for all you do ;)
I’m not in the medical field but this surprises me. One would assume that more experience would be needed before critical care duties would be assigned.
I guess I shouldn’t assume anything.
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My son spent three weeks in ICU last year. He had nurses with a range of experience. But that unit is filled with young, single nurses, male and female. I think they have difficulty keeping experienced nurses due to the extreme stress level. The nurses with children worked part time. They lose multiple patients each week. (Trauma unit for region) these nurses would be screwed if an Ebola patient came through.