Here is a well-written piece by an NP that was published in The New York Times: ''His Service Ended, but the Battles Raged On.'' It's a case study by a spinal cord NP about a veteran patient, with some interesting insight about the risk of patients abusing prescriptions.

After being exposed to it for a while you begin to think ''medical English'' is your actual language, whereby everything you learned in school becomes a second language that you have to use with patients. This really gives ''English as a second language'' new meaning. I recently saw a license plate that read ''HCT436,'' and immediately saw it as ...

  Mitch Woldt, BSN, RN,  is a nurse at the University of Minnesota Medical Center in Minneapolis. I am a male who recently became a registered nurse. Through college and my first few months working, I have noticed and felt many emotions. There are two main and important points I would like to share so others know and understand what ...

For many of our patients, their HIV status is the least of their problems. The population of people we deal with not only suffers from the disease, but from their addictions, homelessness, abusive relationships and indifference. I've come to learn that these people view our clinic as much more than just their doctor's office. For a lot of ...

Working in the ER, I see a lot of life altering events. I frequently realize any one of these could happen to me or my family. I try hard not to bring my work home with me, but sometimes the feelings are hard to leave behind. I can see my family members in the faces of visitors or the eyes of the patient. When I call home just ...

I like Mike Rowe. He seems like the kind of guy I would want on my team. No matter how hard it gets, no matter how bad it seems, he is the one who is smiling and joking around with the crew.  We are like that at my facility. No matter how busy, no matter how many upset folks we have, we smile, joke and put our patients at ...

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. ...

Life isn't about avoiding storms, but about learning to dance in the rain. Most of my life's storms result from those everyday events that pop up like little twirling tornados and send me into a tailspin. More and more I'm realizing they usually come from a predictable and avoidable source: my unmet expectations.  Whether at home or ...

I'm working in an acute care rehab department this month. It is in crisis. There has been a leadership void for three weeks because a decision was made to change the direction of the department. As so often happens in these situations, the manager was asked to leave.  Upper management wanted to bring in someone new. These decisions have ...

Since nurses have the five rights when it comes to medicine administration (the right drug, the right dose, the right route, the right time, the right patient) I figured it was time to establish the five rights with physical therapy administration. They are as follows: 1)      The Right Order. The PT should ...