I once saw an ad on TV showing a postoperative patient returning from surgery and being told ''the surgery went well, but you have cancer'' by her physician, who promptly leaves the patient in the hallway.  As nurses, part of your job will be to dispel any misconceptions patients are left with after their encounters with their physicians. ...

To maintain the safety of nursing home residents statewide, Gov. Brad Henry of Oklahoma signed into law June 9 an act that will keep sex offenders from standard LTC facilities. Separate nursing homes outside of the prison system, with specially trained staff, and extra surveillance and security measures will be created to house them, instead. ...

On the floor of a New York ED waiting room, a 49-year-old woman convulsed for 30 minutes. When she stopped, she was dead. No one did anything but nudge her after she stilled and call for help a few minutes later. In fact, no one - not a single staff member - had done anything in the 24 hours since she had been involuntarily checked into the ...

Since becoming the editor of ADVANCE in 2000, the thought has often occurred to me that PTs and PTAs are a surprisingly well-informed and opinionated bunch. But they are also a lot of fun as well. This was proved to me on June 13 at the annual APTA conference in San Antonio, as APTA premiered its first Oxford Debate. PT experts on both sides ...

The following is a true story. We had a patient who needed a new mattress. My facility works with a medical equipment company that provides this service. After I had sent all the necessary paperwork, I received a rather startling phone call. The woman at the supply office was upset that we didn't let them know the patient was HIV-positive. I ...

LPNs often comment on the lack of respect they receive from others in the medical field, particularly RNs. In some instances, RNs fail to acknowledge the education LPNs have, confining LPNs' abilities to a small range of tasks and their intelligence to an even smaller scope, some LPNs say. RNs are also accused of taking for granted the LPN's ...

For every nurse who had to go through the student lab multiple times until you learned how to open a sterile package without contaminating it, you'll appreciate this description  of a program to teach residents how to do procedures, What is innovative in academic medicine has been a standard of nursing education for almost ever, If you're not ...

I've been thinking about all the press AIDS received back in its early days. There was a lot of media attention back then and a lot of awareness. Now, 27 years later, we see news reports and celebrities traveling to Africa to shed light on an epidemic that has infected millions. But these front-page stories and images we used to see here have all ...

Many nurses and members of the general public think the only purpose of the state nursing board is to license and re-license RNs and LPNs. While licensing is a function of the board its primary mission is to protect the health, safety and welfare of its citizens. How does the board maintain the mission's integrity? One method is through a ...

I recently read a letter to the editor in which an OT called PTs on the carpet for ''pushing too hard.'' The author was a retired OT who had undergone physical therapy and felt her physical condition had been adversely affected by PTs who aggressively forged ahead without regard to her individual physical status. The fact that she appeared to be ...