Japan Earthquake Aftermath: What Nurses Need to Know About Radiation Exposure

Airborne radioactive material can have an effe...

By Maureen Shawn Kennedy, editor-in-chief

The pictures are horrifying. First a 9.0 magnitude earthquake, then a tsunami, and now the Japanese people are perilously close to another disaster from radiation leaking from damaged nuclear power plants.

The death toll, already in the thousands, possibly tens of thousands, will undoubtedly climb without the intervention from disaster relief organizations, which may be reluctant to send their responders into areas with high radiation. After its ships and crew were exposed to radiation from a leaking reactor (the New York Times reported that the deck crew on the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan was exposed to radiation that “caused them to receive a month’s worth of radiation in about an hour”), the U.S. Navy repositioned its ships further off the coast of Japan as a precaution, and is conducting relief operations from the north, away from the wind currents.

There’s been much discussion in the media about the effects of radiation, what levels are harmful, etc, and nurses may indeed receive questions from patients or families with members participating in relief efforts. Here are two articles from AJN that will help you answer questions (they’ll be free until April 18):

Here’s an excerpt from the first of these two articles:

PATIENT DECONTAMINATION
• Remove the patient’s clothing and dress him in
scrubs or a gown.
• […]

2016-11-21T13:13:46-05:00March 16th, 2011|nursing perspective|3 Comments
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Six Degrees of Separation: How Close Is Too Close?

By Julianna Paradisi, RN, OCN

I stand in the fluorescent-lit hallway, waiting my turn at the window to pick up two units of blood from the blood bank. Ahead of me, a woman whose hair is swallowed up by a paper bouffant cap wears blue scrubs and hot pink Crocs on her feet. I assume she’s from OR, because of her garb. The blood bank is located in a staff only access area, and the hallway is narrow. Loitering, I feel the same awkwardness I feel standing on a sidewalk while waiting my turn at an ATM. What’s the socially acceptable separation between the person I’m waiting behind and myself? Too much, I block the hallway or the sidewalk for others. Not enough space, and I intrude on the interaction. How close is too close?

On my way back to the clinic, I carry the units of blood in a Playmate cooler marked “Biohazard.” I stand in another hallway waiting for an elevator. It’s flu season, so I hit the “up” button with my elbow to avoid getting virus on my hands. I look around first so visitors won’t see me do it. I don’t care if hospital staff watches. They understand. The elevator door opens, and I get in. After the doors close, the person standing next to me coughs as if expectorating a lung. This is too close.

Back in the clinic, I double-check the first unit of blood with another nurse. […]

2016-11-21T13:13:47-05:00March 15th, 2011|nursing perspective|1 Comment
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A Nursing Report That Deserves More Than The Usual Shrug

By Christine Moffa, MS, RN, AJN clinical editor

The IOM report The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health came out this past October, causing a flurry of excitement among some in the nursing world and groans of “big deal” among others. My immediate instinct was to shrug my shoulders and wonder if yet another report will really make a difference at the bedside.

AJN addressed the report and its implications in our December 2010 and February 2011 issues—so I knew it must be very important. But, for some reason, I had assumed it was going to be a dry, unreadable bore. And I put off reading it until recently, when I needed to use it as a reference. And wow, was I in for a surprise! I especially liked the inclusion of real case studies of nurses from different backgrounds and work experience who are making a difference in health care.

It’s inspirational, and I encourage all nurses out there—and anyone with a stake in health care (that’s pretty much everybody)—to take a look. (Tip: I found downloading the PDF version didn’t take long, and it was much easier to navigate than the HTML version.) If you’d like to hear more on the report and what it means to nurses, sign up for our upcoming Webcast […]

2016-11-21T13:13:51-05:00March 14th, 2011|career, nursing perspective, nursing research|5 Comments
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Laundry

I remember feeling just as wide-eyed and excited as she looked. And I like having students with me, especially ones who are so teachable that they soak up everything around them like a giant sponge. My student’s willingness to do “everything” served her well, as far as learning experiences go, and she approached tasks without trepidation. She was elated with success (insertion of a nasogastric tube) and mortified with failure (insertion of a rectal tube; she actually vomited). There were moments of fascination (touring the ICU and helping settle in a trauma admission) and boredom (attending a pain management process improvement meeting). There was also frustration; at the end of the day, she ruined her new scrub top with a spill of dark orange rifaximin.

2016-11-21T13:13:52-05:00March 10th, 2011|career, students|6 Comments
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On the Web: A Tragic Choice, Wasting Berwick, Cost Control, A Nurse’s Comfort Zone

President Barack Obama speaks to a joint sessi...

An estimated 60% of American bankruptcies result from overwhelming medical costs. My uncle’s tale illuminates the dual tragedy of suffering catastrophic illness and being uninsured.

Read the rest of this troubling post at The Health Care Blog by surgeon John Maa if you doubt that we need health care reform in this country.

A measure of how unserious we are about fixing the problem of health care quality and costs in the U.S. can be found in reports that Don Berwick, President Obama’s choice to run the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), continues to have an uphill battle for confirmation, despite being widely acknowledged within the medical community as the best choice for the challenging job.

Since we’re talking policy, there’s an incisive post at the Health Affairs Blog on where our energies should—and should not—be going in controlling costs. Here’s an excerpt:

The current cry to reduce Federal deficits and debt growth by reducing Medicare and Medicaid entitlements is totally missing the key issue: the need to moderate all health care inflation. This should be the time for a national debate on how to best tackle the underlying cost problem, for the sake of our future, the economy, and access to health care.

The June 13-19, 2009 Economist editorialized: “America has the most wasteful […]

2016-11-21T13:13:54-05:00March 8th, 2011|Nursing|1 Comment
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Views expressed on the blog are solely those of the authors or persons quoted. They do not necessarily reflect AJN’s views or those of Wolters Kluwer Health/Lippincott Williams and Wilkins.
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