Off the Charts

Top 10 (New) AJN Posts of 2011

Some of our posts, like this one from 2009 (“New Nurses Face Reality Shock in Hospitals–So What Else Is New?”) keep getting found and read. They remain as relevant today as they were when we posted them. Our top 20 posts for the year (according to reader hits, that is) include several others like this: “What Is Meaningful Use? One Savvy Nurse’s Take”; “Is the Florence Nightingale Pledge in Need of a Makeover?”; “Do Male Nurses Face Reverse Sexism?”; “Are Nursing Strikes Ethical? New Research Raises the Stakes”; and “Workplace Violence Against Nurses: Neither Inevitable or Acceptable.”

But putting aside these contenders (why do so many of them have questions in their titles?), here are the top 10 (again, according to our readers) new posts of 2011, in case you missed them along the way. Which doesn’t mean that these are (necessarily) our best posts, or a representative sample, or that many others didn’t hit home for various subgroups of readers.

While we all get a little tired of lists by this time in the year, we don’t really use them an awful lot here at Off the Charts. So please indulge us this once, and thanks to everyone who wrote, read, and commented on this blog in 2011.—Jacob Molyneux, AJN senior editor/blog editor

1. “Notes of a Student Nurse: A Dose of Reality,” by Jennifer-Clare Williams

2. “Placenta Facebook Photos: Nurse and […]

Jacob Molyneux, senior editor/blog editor2016-11-21T13:11:07-05:00December 20th, 2011|healthcare social media|2 Comments

Those Who Wait: Recent Work in ‘Art of Nursing’

By Sylvia Foley, AJN senior editor

“I held that stone / in my hand for hours while they split your bones,” says the narrator of Janet Parkinson’s poem “Talisman,” which appears this month in Art of Nursing. The poem speaks to the tremendous strain of waiting for the outcome of a loved one’s emergency surgery. It’s about the need for connection over great distances, for a “stone constant” in the face of grave uncertainty. The poet’s voice is unsentimental and steady, and the poem, just seven lines, itself feels almost talismanic. (Art of Nursing is always free online—just click through to the PDF file.)

In Roger Davies’s poem “Preparing to Pretend to Knit at the Chemotherapy Clinic,” featured in October’s Art of Nursing, a husband also waits, feeling helpless. “I’ll choose the long, elegant needles,” he says, imagining homespun wools dyed in autumn colors. Recalling his mother’s “nonchalant / competence” at the craft, he longs for the solace found in knowing what to do—even if it’s only how to hold the needles. In the poem’s last lines, the narrator says, “I could look out the window / to this fading autumn day.” But it’s clear that he’s not quite ready to see that view yet.

Rebecca Thomas’s painting “The Waiting Room: Norma,” featured in November, depicts the artist’s grandmother, who […]

Guest Author2016-11-21T13:11:08-05:00December 19th, 2011|Nursing, patient engagement|1 Comment

Reading Between the Whiteboard Lines in the ICU

By Marcy Phipps, RN, a regular contributor to this blog. Her essay, “The Soul on the Head of a Pin,” was published in the May 2010 issue of AJN.

My hospital uses dry-erase whiteboards as a tool to communicate with patients and family members. Mounted to the walls in the patients’ rooms, the boards are prominent and concise. Aside from a lot of basic information, notes get added to the board when diagnostic tests are completed, when complementary therapies have been implemented, and when housekeeping staff visit. The “meat” of the board, however, is the section that addresses plans and goals for the day. The plans and goals are updated and modified continuously by nursing staff. They’re specific to each patient, yet, despite their personalization, the goals for ICU patients tend to fall into distinct categories.

The first category includes goals which are often set by the patients themselves. They tend to require a certain amount of collaboration and active participation. These types of goals, which include things like “maximize incentive spirometer use,” “ambulate,” and “advance diet,” imply a relatively healthy state and tend to predict transfer orders.

The next type of goal is aimed at restoring health and stability. These goals don’t necessarily require patient participation and often focus on pathophysiologic processes. On the whiteboards of these rooms, the listed goals are likely to include things like “wean ventilator,” “control agitation,” “control fever,” or “increase level […]

Marcy Phipps, BSN, RN, CCRN, CFRN2016-11-21T13:11:09-05:00December 15th, 2011|nursing perspective, Patients|3 Comments

Health Care Work and Hypochondria: When Knowledge Equals Fear

By Amy M. Collins, associate editor

This Thursday I will graduate. Not from college—sadly, that was many years ago. Rather, I will finish a health anxiety class, taken in desperation when untimely hypochondria struck. I admit it. I’ve always been a bit of a worrier when it comes to health and illness. Working as a health care writer/editor doesn’t always help. I just have too much information at my fingertips, and a brain that jumps to the extreme (a pain in the side can mean cancer, and so on).

Before getting a degree in writing and journalism, I studied human biology with the intention of going into some type of health care work. But reading about diseases made me start to self-diagnose with fervor, so I decided to switch majors. And this was before the advent of the Internet, where one can constantly consult “Dr. Google.”

Years ago, while working at a medical publishing company in Spain, things got worse. I was put on the cardiovascular beat, which only increased my health fears. Diagnosed with mitral valve prolapse as a child, and on medication for arrhythmia at the time, reading about this particular disease made my heart literally flutter. My boss, recognizing my discomfort, took me off the topic and asked me to instead write […]

Amy M. Collins, managing editor2016-11-21T13:11:10-05:00December 14th, 2011|Nursing|4 Comments

Say It Ain’t So: Another ‘No’ on the Cookie Dough

By Karen Roush, MS, RN, FNP-C, AJN clinical managing editor

I admit it. For me, the best part of baking chocolate chip cookies is eating the raw dough. I know there’s a risk for a food-borne illness, but it’s hard to resist at least one mouthful—well, maybe two—of that combination of brown sugar, butter, and chocolate chips. Now, just in time for the holiday baking season, there’s even more evidence that taking that bite is not such a great idea.

A recent study by Neil and colleagues found that a 2009 outbreak of Escherichia coli was associated with eating raw cookie dough: 77 people across multiple states came down with an E. coli O157:H7 infection. The researchers found the common exposure was to a ready-to-bake, prepackaged cookie dough that the patients had eaten raw. They believe the most likely culprit in the dough was contaminated flour. (The researchers note that flour has been implicated in food-borne Salmonella and E. coli outbreaks in the past.)

So, when educating patients about safety this holiday season, remind them that food products meant to be cooked or baked should never be eaten raw. As for me, this holiday I think I’ll head to the bakery and stay out of temptation’s way.

What other holiday safety tips have you got for patients?