Here is something to ponder:  What do you do as a nursing student (or a nurse) when one of your parents is diagnosed with a life-threatening disease? Such was the case for me in early 1998 when my dad was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. I was in the first year of my practical nurse schooling, and I didn't know how much of a ...

We entered critical care as our last clinical rotation and I am absolutely loving it. I come home each day exhausted from running around and speaking to numerous specialties. On my first day, I walked into the room of my first patient and find the patient's SPO2 in the high 80s with the nasal cannula near his ears. After I adjusted the nasal ...

We landed at Ramstein Air Force Base this morning. The flight over on the C-17 Globemaster was quite loud and cold. In my healthy, wide-eyed and excited state, I had a difficult time sleeping and relaxing. I can't imagine that experience under critical care. The transport plane we took was returning to Ramstein for regular service. ...

Seems like every morning, I wake up to NPR sadly reporting another group of soldiers and Marines killed and wounded in combat in Iraq. Now, with the numbers reaching 4,000 from combat over the past 5 years, I regrettably admit how desensitized I've become to the war, and have proverbially hit snooze. USA Today reports as of Sunday, Oct. 7, at ...