So You’re a Nurse With a Story to Tell…

Madeleine Mysko, MA, RN, coordinator of AJN’s monthly Reflections column, is a poet, novelist, and graduate of the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars who has taught creative writing in Baltimore for many years.

karindalziel/ via Flickr Creative Commons karindalziel/ via Flickr Creative Commons

Whenever I meet someone new who happens to be a nurse—in both clinical and social settings—I wait for the right moment to mention my work at AJN on the Reflections column. It’s not only that I’m proud of the column. It’s also that I’m forever on the lookout for that next submission—for a fresh, compelling story I just know is destined to shine (accompanied by a fabulous professional illustration) on the inside back page of AJN.

“I imagine you have a story or two to tell,” I’ll say to a nurse I’ve just met—which is the same thing I say, whenever I have the chance, to nurses I’ve known for years. I mean it sincerely; given the vantage point on humanity that our profession affords, I actually do believe that every nurse is carrying around material for a terrific story.

The response I usually get (along with a wry smile, the raising of eyebrows, or a short laugh) is, “Oh yes. I have stories.”

But then—even as I’m mentioning the Reflections author guidelines, even as […]

2018-04-17T13:41:27-04:00January 30th, 2015|narratives, Nursing, nursing perspective, nursing stories|5 Comments
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Too Tired to Nurse

By Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

by patchy patch, via flickr by patchy patch, via flickr

Just about every nurse I know has been “asked” (or “guilted” or “mandated”) to work an additional shift on top of a grueling one. The worst such experience I ever had was having to work from midnight to 8 am after working a straight week of 4 pm to midnight shifts. I was exhausted, but someone had called in sick, leaving only two RNs and one aide for the 11-bed ED trauma unit.

I was so tired that at one point I found myself falling asleep while I was standing by a patient’s bed charting vital signs. I couldn’t remember the blood pressure reading I had obtained just moments before. It was good luck that I didn’t make an error—and had the good sense to have a colleague double-check medications I was readying (these were the old days, before unit dosing). […]

2018-03-28T10:19:26-04:00December 8th, 2014|Nursing, nursing perspective|7 Comments
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The Gaza Conflict, Through the Lens of Nursing

By Jacob Molyneux, AJN senior editor

In 2005, AJN published an article looking at the experiences of nurses in Israel and in the Palestinian territories (free until September 15; choose ‘full text’ or ‘PDF’ in upper-right of the article landing page). Here’s an excerpt:

” [N]urses in the region have many of the same problems American nurses have: disparate educational levels, struggles for professional recognition and workplace representation. The nurses I met came into the profession for diverse reasons and are working in a remarkable variety of settings, carrying on in the face of political, professional, economic, military, and personal difficulties. Yet I was amazed at the things these nurses have in common with each other—and with us. As I listened to them describe their motivations and aspirations and watched them work, the seemingly impenetrable barrier created by the ongoing military and political conflict melted away.”

Photos and captions from 2005 article about Palestinian and Israeli nurse. Courtesy of Constance Romilly. Photos and captions from 2005 AJN article. Courtesy of Constance Romilly. Click to expand image.

The current conflict between Israel and those living in the Palestinian territories is another chapter in a long story. Our focus at AJN is not on the politics of the situation or the rhetoric of blame coming from supporters […]

2016-11-21T13:04:05-05:00August 13th, 2014|Nursing, nursing perspective|0 Comments
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Time to Get Serious About ‘Handshake-Free’ Health Care?

By Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

Tombstone handshake, from Mel B, via Flickr. Tombstone handshake, from Mel B, via Flickr.

Last month in JAMA, Mark Sklansky and colleagues wrote a Viewpoint column, “Banning the Handshake From the Health Care Setting.” The article explored the idea and its feasibility, while acknowledging the importance of such rituals as handshakes in human interaction. In the end, the authors argued that it’s an idea we might need to start taking more seriously.

Is this an antisocial idea? That’s debatable, but it would certainly be a good step towards reducing transmission of infections—and one that’s probably long overdue.

It’s well known that pathogens are easily transmissible from health care workers’ hands, even if they practice hand hygiene in between seeing patients. But as the authors remind us, heath care workers are notoriously bad at doing so—they cite research showing that “compliance of health care personnel with hand hygiene programs averages 40%.”

And it’s no better in ambulatory care settings—an original research article we published in March 2013 that measured hand hygiene compliance by health care workers in an ambulatory care clinic found that, even after a campaign to improve adherence, compliance (as measured by direct observation) had only improved to between 32% and 51% at one-month […]

2016-11-21T13:04:36-05:00June 2nd, 2014|nursing perspective|2 Comments
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Compelled by Professionalism

Julianna Paradisi, RN, OCN, writes a monthly post for this blog and works as an infusion nurse in outpatient oncology.

ParadisiThanksIllustration“Ah, Julianna.”

This greeting from a physician marked my arrival at work. I assumed he was about to give me information or an order about one of our patients. I prepared myself for the forthcoming shift—”Ready or not, here it comes.”

Instead, he did something completely unexpected. Quickly retreating to his office, he reappeared, extending towards me a bright blue envelope with my name neatly written on the back.

It contained a greeting card. Not the generic kind hospitals provide managers in bulk for staff recognition. Not the “You’ve Been Caught Doing Something Fabulous!” quarter page–sized certificates available in the staff lounge for coworkers to fill out in recognition of their peers. This was a genuine, bona fide greeting card, the kind you have to go to a store and select from a rack and purchase. Inside, he’d addressed it to me again, with a personal note in handwriting, shattering the long-held belief that physicians cannot write legibly in cursive.

Being thanked by a physician for an act of nursing I had provided for his patient isn’t what caught me off guard. During my years of practice, many physicians have verbally expressed appreciation for my nursing skills. A half-dozen have even apologized for disagreeing with an assessment of mine (only to find out later […]

2016-11-21T13:04:52-05:00April 30th, 2014|career, nursing perspective|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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