BOOM.

91% on my Capstone paper???

Don't mind if I do.

I will now dramatically throw away all of the research articles that I used to write it :)

Also, took the HESI exam today (predictor for the NCLEX, which is our licensing exam). Did I rock it? No. Do I care that much? Not really.

Still calling this day a WIN.

Teaching/Learning Project

Today my clinical group did our Teaching/Learning project at the Children's Center. We taught them about summer safety, including helmet use, hydration, water safety and sunscreen. I did all of the teaching with the kids and had fun seeing everyone :) Then we did four different stations for the different areas. We also got water bottles donated for each child and we got 10 bike helmets donated to the center. The kids really were into it and had a lot of fun. It went really well and I'm so glad that everything worked out! I'm also glad it's done. We still have to do a presentation on the project on August 2nd but we are mostly finished with it already! My group is very on top of things. It's wonderful.

The pictures above are of the front and back of the poster we used with the kids and one of us getting trained on how to properly fit bicycle helmets! :)

This is my now.

I know my blog updating skills have been horrible lately, but it's because the past few weeks have been absolutely crazy it seems. Since the last update I have had two LEI visits, finished my entire LEI binder and turned it in, finished and turned in my Capstone paper, learned how to get my RN license, applied for jobs, and had 6 more days of community health. Phew! A lot of happenings. Here's a quick summary to catch you up on some of things that have been going on lately!

The most notable thing in the past few weeks has been my CAPSTONE. My Capstone paper ended up being about 19 pages of fun, which I was still finishing the night before it was due. Typical. But I actually feel really good about it and I found out my clinical instructor is the one that got my paper to grade so I'm hoping I will do well on it since she has said she's a fairly easy grader. I will get it back a week from today so stay tuned for that! *Cross fingers* The capstone was the one really big thing standing between us and finishing school and it has been the sole source of everyone's never ending stress for the past 9 weeks. We are all so glad it's over. I have never felt more relieved to have something taken out of my hands as I did when I handed in that paper.

Community Health has been going pretty well. It's really boring and kind of frustrating because we never really know what's going on and it's all very flybytheseatofyourpants when we get there in the morning. It's okay though. I have been going on a lot of visits with my community health worker in the mornings and getting more involved in the teaching during those visits, but it's difficult since most of the people I see it is my first time meeting them so it's hard to build any kind of relationship. I also got to spend a day observing in the Tuberculosis clinic and another day observing in the STD clinic. Both of them were really cool experiences and I feel like I actually got something out of being there. In general though, I am not sure how much I am gaining from this rotation. I know that I am learning about the community and about resources that are available to those that can't otherwise afford them. I'm sure I'm getting more out of it than I realize. Tomorrow we are doing our Teaching/Learning project at the Children's Center, which I think I talked about earlier. But we are teaching the kids about summer safety, including water safety, hydration, bike and helmet safety and sunscreen use. It should be a good time, I'm excited to see my kids and for everyone in my group to meet them. I think they're kind of great :) We only have three more days of community health and then I am done with clinical forever. Crazy.

Last week we learned about how to get our LICENSE!!!!! It's kind of a big deal. We also learned how to send in our application for testing, get fingerprinted, background checked, etc. Pretty much everything we need to do to become real RN's. It was the most useful lecture we have had all semester. Sadly I'm not joking. So probably next week I will get that all filled out and sent in and then go and get my fingerprints and background check done! I also applied for JOBS today! I applied for a few at Spectrum for adult Med/Surg, about 5 at Helen Devos, one at Metro and one at Zeeland, so hopefully I will hear back from someone in the next few weeks. I hate the waiting game.

I am amazed at how fast this semester has started going. Starting about 3 weeks ago the semester just started FLYING by. We only have 16 days left. Two weeks from Friday we will take our last final. I feel like it's going so fast that I am forgetting to take the time to enjoy these last few weeks. These are the last few weeks that I will spend with all of my nursing friends. The last time I will be in the CHS building. The last time I will do so many things. So I am trying to take it all in and stop trying to wish it away. The photo is of my tattoo. It says "This is my now" and it is my reminder to myself to appreciate the moment that you are in because right now is all you have and it's the only "now" you will ever get. So my goal for the next two weeks is to enjoy every second of it and every second of my time with my friends. I can't believe 5 years of college ends in 2 weeks.

Core Health & Home visits

Okay, it took two more days, but I finally feel like I actually know what is going on in Community Health. So half of our rotation is with Core Health. Core Health is a Spectrum Health program that uses community health workers to follow people with congestive heart failure and diabetes. The community health workers (CHW) visit the clients in their homes for the entire year that they are in the program, usually once every two weeks. So every morning from 9-12, we go over to core health and follow a community health worker on all of their home visits. The idea is that the first week we follow them and just watch, the second week we do vitals and some teaching, and then the weeks after that we keep taking on more responsibility until we are leading the visits on our work and the CHW just kind of watches. It's pretty cool I guess. My CHW follows all patients with diabates. It's definitely different to follow someone that isn't a nurse, but I think it provides a different perspective and I'm hoping to learn a lot.

The other half of our day is spent at the Health Department. At the health department we have three of our own clients that we have to go out and do home visits with, so I called today and set up all of my appointments for next week. Hopefully everyone shows up and things go well! I also got the official okay from the children's center for us to do our project there so I'm very excited about that :)

ALSO Core Health is right across the street from Ferguson (where I did my Mental Health rotation) so I went over today and talked to some of the residents that I always hung out with there. It was really cool to see and talk to them again! :)

Below is just a summary of the Core Health Diabetes Program:

Our Diabetes Program
The Core Health Diabetes Program helps individuals with diabetes, or those at risk for diabetes, improve their health. Working with your doctor, we will:

Educate you about your disease and how to access care
Motivate you to live a healthier lifestyle

Our Services
You will receive one-on-one visits from a registered nurse (RN) and community health worker (CHW). Depending on what you need, our services will help you:

Set personal health goals
Learn about your diabetes and how to better manage risk factors
Connect with community resources

How Our Diabetes Program Benefits You
You will benefit from our program by:

Understanding how to take care of yourself and your health condition
Becoming a self-empowered diabetes expert
Building your confidence and personal strength
Improving your long-term health

Eligibility
Participants of the Core Health Diabetes Program must:

Have Medicaid insurance or are uninsured
Be 18 years or older
Live in the Grand Rapids area
Be able to perform everyday activities such as bathing, dressing and eating on your own
Be at risk for, or diagnosed with diabetes

Your doctor may refer you to this program, or you may call 616.391.6135 for enrollment information.

Cost
There is no cost to participate in the Core Health Diabetes Program. Call our office at 616.391.6135 to find out if you qualify.

What You Can Do
The safest and best way to prevent or treat your disease is to make healthy lifestyle changes, such as:

Be active
Eat right
Lose weight
Quit smoking
Take your medicine as recommended by your doctor
Know your numbers
Understand your disease as much as possible
Keep scheduled doctor appointments

Should be a good time! Only 38 days to go!

KCHD Day One..

So I started my Community Health rotation started today at the KCHD, Kent County Health Department. I was not excited but tried to go into it with a good attitude. I didn't get lost getting there or getting into the building so at least that was a good start! Then I thought that today was just going to be orientation type stuff, the tour, going over the syllabus and assignments and all that jazz. Nope. We had two speakers come in and talk to us, one about safety when doing home visits and the other one about Healthy Kent, a county program based on Healthy People 2020. Then our instructor tells us that we are just jumping right in today and following public health nurses on home visits. Some people followed nurses while others followed dieticians and social workers. All of the people that we went out with though were part of a program that works with pregnant moms and their babies up until they are one year old. So I went with my nurse on four different home visits around Grand Rapids. It was actually kind of informative but definitely not something I am really interested in as a career. So moral of the story, I still don't entirely know what I am going to be doing in Community Health but I know a lot of the stuff we are going to be doing is with the CORE Program, and we have that orientation tomorrow morning so then I will know more. Also, we have to do a "Teaching/Learning Project" this semester and last semester they did it at a daycare program at the YMCA. Before I knew this though, we all said where we work and I was talking about working at the Children's Center and long story short, we are going to do our project at the Center as long as it's okay with them. Which I'm sure it will be :) So I'm really excited about that. I love my kids and I love when my friends get to meet them, so it should be fun.

Hopefully I will know more tomorrow!

End of Leadership and half way done :)

I know, I know, I said I would be better at updating. Yet here we are...ten days later. Haha I guess it's better than the 20 days I went between the last two entries! So I promised a more thoughtful reflection of my time in my leadership rotation and here it is. Leadership was such a great experience. I really enjoyed feeling like I actually knew what I was doing and being somewhere long enough to get comfortable there. This experience on the other hand, makes me just want to be done with school that much more. Once you spend 6 weeks in one place, getting to know the floor, the daily routine, the medications and ALL of the staff, it really sucks to just pack it in and leave. Leadership also made me see that I am ready to be a nurse. I am able to work with other nurses, physicians, techs, and families and really do well at it. This also makes me just want to be done with school and have a job. Somewhere that I can put it the work to learn all about and then once I finally get the hang of everything, I can just STAY there. On my last day a bunch of the nurses that I was in a room with asked my instructor if I could just skip community health and stay with them the rest of the semester. I wish. We are at the point now where we are starting to job hunt and I'm working on some networking with people I know in the hospitals and getting ready to start emailing people and applying. SCARY. I'm hoping that with the help of my preceptor (who has worked in almost every area of the children's hospital and knows EVERYONE) and other nurses that work down there, they will help me get in touch with some of the managers on the floors to send in my resume. Networking. Boom. I hate playing this game....Stay tuned for the job hunt updates.

Also this week, my group did our evidence-based practice presentation on Tuesday. It was about the effectiveness of transitional interventions to prepare families to move from the acute/critical care setting to home. Super exciting stuff. 30 minutes of fun to be exact. But I'm glad it's over and that we did well on it. I also had my final evaluation for my leadership rotation. Don't worry, I passed. My instructor thinks I'm awesome and continued her semester long goal of peer-pressuring me into going to grad school. Not gonna happen, but I appreciate that she thinks I should.

I also finally picked a capstone topic for SURE. I'm doing "Reducing hospital emergency department visits for asthma in school age children." Sounds exciting right? I've determined that nursing is not even remotely exciting this semester. So yay capstone paper. I already have 21 articles for it and I'm super pumped to start reading them. Bleh, so over this.

In other news, had our first exam today, worth 20% of our grade. Studied for literally less than an hour. 95%. Damn I'm good.

44 days! The picture of the paper chain is when it had 50 days left, it's getting so tiny :) Oh, and the semester is half way over.

And I start my community health rotation. I literally could not be less excited.

5 weeks down and 50-something days to go

I've been a big slacker lately on the blog, which I regret because I don't want to quit updating this close to the end, but I think it's just because honestly, I am getting tired of talking about nursing school and kind of ready to be done. I haven't been meaning to neglect it, I just don't have tons to say! Leadership has been really great, for lack of a more eloquent way to say it. Last time I updated I had only gone to three days of Leadership (in the pediatric sedation unit, if you forgot), and now I have been there a total of 11 days and have only two left to go! In the last few weeks I have learned so much about communicating with families and talking with doctors, nurses, techs, and just a whole lot of people. The department that I am working in is just incredible. I really enjoy all of the nurses and nurse techs that work there and it has really made this rotation a wonderful experience. I have gotten very comfortable with telling families about the medications we use, what is going to happen before, during and after the procedure, and giving discharge instructions. I am getting much more independent and able to take on more responsibility each day that I am there. My preceptor is wonderful and we get along really well. She is great at answering all of my questions and letting me take on more responsibility, but not in a way that pushes me into anything she doesn't think I can handle. While sometimes I am out of my comfort zone, it's in a way that pushes me to be better, not in a way that scares me. Honestly, it's just been really great. I am really enjoying it and I feel that even though I may not be working on a floor and getting that kind of experience, I am still learning so much about working with other people and about communicating with patients and families. I can't believe it will be over on Tuesday!

I promise to write a more thoughtful and reflective entry later this week when I have more time! This week I am preparing for my Evidence-based practice presentation that my group is presenting next Tuesday, finishing up all of my evaluations, journals and paperwork from Leadership that is due on Wednesday, and continuing to work on my capstone paper, so it has definitely been busy! I am looking forward to finishing Leadership on Tuesday, having class on Wednesday and then taking 5 days off before my presentation and the start of my next and LAST rotation next week!

When I went to google "Leadership" I brain-farted and typed "Leader fish" and whelp, got the picture of just that. A Leader fish. I like it. Leader fish it is.

I also almost forget the not obligatory countdown update at the end of each post! What was I thinking?

**DRUMROLL PLEASE**

53 days to go! :)

(New paper chain picture soon!)