Yes, I'm pretty psyched to be doing my OB rotation and Major Urban Medical Center...but boy are they ever INVASIVE with their patients! I did TWO straight-caths on one woman in labor (to be honest, the pt. asked me to, since she couldn't feel her bladder what with the epidural turned up so high)...and every time I have spoken to about half the nurses about natural childbirth, they laugh and tell me "oh sweetie, you don't know what you're talking about. The pain is like NOTHING you can imagine! Don't get your hopes up when you have kids someday! You WILL get the epidural!"
This is why patients come in panicked, at 2 centimeters, with the baby floating high, begging for an epidural "before it gets bad". Because we get told we CANNOT POSSIBLY deal with a natural childbirth.
My mom did TWO- myself and my brother. She says yes, it DOES hurt like hell, but being tied down would be WORSE, and anyway, it went faster since she could walk around.
Seriously, what's with tying all the women to the bed with the heart monitors? They're healthy, they're young, WHY DO THEY HAVE TO LIE THERE? Is the world going to END because we cannot see everything for 10 minutes? Is it?
Although I'm gaining a LOT of experience fast, this place makes me NEVER want to have kids- it seems a lot like they torture women for the hell of it.
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4 comments:
WOW.. lol that posts scares me. caths are one of the things I AM NOT LOOKING FORWARD TO =|. I still haven't gone for clinicals but I'm just so fearful of them.
I am an L&D RN for 15 yrs, and after 10K deliveries (some myself) I agree with you. It is horrifying the way most American hospitals that I have worked at will treat their patients. I had to explain to the Canadian RNs I worked with in Canada why women come in with birth plans. They all laugh when they see one because here, in Western Canada...most hospital birthing units will allow a mom to deliver whatever way they like....and we don't slip in saline locks unless a VBAC or a high risk (we did cardiac high risk moms at the last hospital i worked at)....very little monitoring...only the initial strip and after that - doppler only...unless problems....and the less sitting in front of the monitor and the more time with the mom coaching ....the better. So, yes. Your perceptions are correct. The IVASIVENESS in L&D is horrifying....
But don't decide not to have kids! Decide to go to a freestanding birth center, or have a home birth with a midwife.
3 in hospital, 6 at home.
Susan Peterson
msx,
with a guy, you hold his penis up straight and thread the catheter down it. Unless he has a big prostate, it is easy.
With a woman, it really varies. The betadine you use to clean them with makes them slippery. It is almost impossible to keep your fingers in one place separating the labia and not reposition them which ruins perfect sterile technique. In practice, this usually isn't done with perfect technique. As long as you don't take the catheter out of the vagina and put it into the bladder! Bring a couple or three with you when you go in the room. Some people say if you wind up in the vagina, leave that one there as a guide to where NOT to go.
Some women have a nice visible hole right near the outside, and some hide it way up inside.
But you'll get the hang of it. I did, and I am really a klutzy type!
Susan Peterson
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