Month: June 2021

• How did the movie affect you (feelings, inspiration, concerns)?

This movie echoed to me the reasons as to why this profession is so special and how I am excited to be entering this profession full of incredible people who want to help others. It was really inspiring to see the pediatric nurses in the beginning do little things to help make the hospital experience for children as less scary as they can. Wearing outfits with fidgets on ID badge, fun clothes looking like a superhero and even an animal covering over the stethoscope are such little things that all add up that aren’t necessary for the job, but they go out of their way to do anything they can to help improve the care of their patients. This also showed me how many different areas of nursing there are and how nursing can quite literally get into any corner of the globe, from the public health nurses having nursing knowledge they also will be asked on for help in everyday tasks like changing a tire. Each nurse that was allowed to tell their story about their passion spoke so highly of their area and their experiences, with this of course comes hard experiences but nursing school so far has showed me that there will be so many more better days than not. Being a nurse is a privilege because we enter the lives of those that are at their lowest moments, our interventions and collaboration with the client and the care team to help them balance all areas of their life to help them get back to living a healthy and happy life.  

• What did you learn from the video (skills you need to develop, connection to your learning)?

Some things that I learned from this video is that there are going to be experiences that it is going to be hard to experience. I am already seeing this at my clinical this semester on R5. For the past two weeks I’ve been assigned to provide care to individuals with history of extensive substance misuse and this is hard for me to see and feel like I am able to provide effective care because I don’t know how to help them. These patients were in extensive pain while on extremely high continuous doses of multiple pain medications, they were advocating for themselves to us (me and the staff nurse) and working with the charge nurse, the pain team and physicians on their case on ways that they could be able to have their pain be decreased to a more manageable level. I felt like I was unable to make a difference through my actions in those moments with the patients, but I was there listening to them advocate, I let them know that we were listening to them and that we would continue the conversation with the rest of their medical team and validating that we can see that they are in pain and we will try and do what we can for them. I need to work on my confidence with interacting with patients that aren’t the most compliant with their behavior and I know that with practice and time that skill will come. Another thing that I learned from this video was how special of a profession nursing is, sometimes the most you can do for your patient is to listen to them, have them trust you and confide in you by meeting people where they are in that moment and see how you can make a difference. As a nurse, you have the opportunity to make a difference in someone’s life through the valuable moments you spend with them.

Career Development

1. How will you prepare for the interview to set you apart from other applicants (research the organization’s mission, priorities, practice model, specific job responsibilities; questions for the interviewer; career goals; interview skills to make a good impression)? 

A way that I plan on preparing for interviews is to: make a word document and type out my answers for potential problems that the recruiters and nurse managers will potentially ask me, review the job listing and know what the requirements are in terms of shifts, message nurses from that organization on linkedin and inquire about the interview process and their experience with it, practice my answers out loud and prep a list of questions to ask the interviewer. I have found nurses at hospitals I am interested in that went to this ABSN program so I use that as a way to make a connection and then inquire more about their job and how their transition was. A way that I want to improve since my last phone interview would be to have the prepared list of answers and know the talking points I want to address, prep a list of questions about how I would fit in the organization, what the turnover is like in the unit, what the nurse residency program entails, what a typical day is like on the unit, and ratios of nurse: patient.

2. How will you describe your strengths, supported by evidence (knowledge and experience gained from the UNE Nursing Program and extracurricular activities, teamwork, communication)?

I plan on describing my strengths by trying to show the interviewer who I am in a short period of time. I want to portray my work ethic on how dedicated, detail-oriented and committed I am to what I do, each thing that I decide to do and pursue has intention and is not merely a fleeting thought. I would like to share the unique experiences I have had throughout my entire UNE education especially the dedication that my cohort has had to stick through this program during COVID and having limited clinical experiences but still making the most of our 16 months. I am very happy that I participated in the Interprofessional Honors program and completed a project with students from 6 other healthcare professions and take that experience into my clinicals now and will apply it in my jobs. My leadership opportunities and positions I believe sets me apart because through these I was able to make a wide variety of connections personally and professionally and worked on my skills to do that, I am a much more confident and outgoing person than from when I stepped on foot on campus 5 years ago. Through many opportunities I have worked with people who have a different work ethic and personality and through each time there was a slight learning curve but we worked together on how to support each other and learned how to approach challenges together as they arose. Being specific but to the point and emitting my passion through my answers will be how I would like to show my strengths.

3. How will you describe your challenges and plans/steps taken to address them?

As for challenges, I believe coming up with an example of how I acted when I was with a ‘difficult’ patient or didn’t work well with a coworker initially would be the best way to describe it. Having concrete answers and utilizing Whitney’s STAR framework I believe will work well especially with highlighting how the situation occurred and what I did and how I learned from it now and am more aware of that mistake to not do it again in the future. Framing my challenges in a way that it was a learning experience and how I recognize those mistakes now while I am a student and in a learning environment will allow me to show that I am not perfect and that I want to improve and am grateful for the chances that I did mess up.