A Happy Thanksgiving

This year for Thanksgiving I had four nursing students with me who lived far away and were unable to go home. Two are sisters from India and two are roommates, both from out of state. We started out at my house baking bread and making delicious curry. In the afternoon we headed over to my sister's house to enjoy the Thanksgiving meal with the rest of my family and some other friends.
The food was delicious and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves and eachother. Lisa and even broke out the Wii. It was a kick in the pants to watch my students play Wii bowling with my mom. Everyone seemed to be getting into it to extent of making sound effects.
After most of the guests had left, we got Priya and Reena to play Guitar Hero; what a hoot! I am so thankful for all the fun loving people in my life!

Celebrating Life's Little Victories

At the end of the long term care rotation I asked my students to write down three goals they hoped to achieve during the acute care rotation. One student (who can sometimes be especially "giggly") stated that she wanted to work on maturity. This goal came from a conversation she had with another nurse about the skills they had learned in skills lab. Apparently she couldn't say she learned about enema administration without laughing.
One day at clinical a nurse asked her to administer a fleets enema to an extremely constipated patient recovering from a hip surgery. With hip precautions a extra person is needed to help turn the patient in such a manner as to protect the joint. I went into the room to help her. In attempt to put the patient at ease we made small talk with her and found out she was from the Olympic Peninsula. We discussed the elk crossing signs in Sequim and the enema was administered without even a smirk! Sometimes it's the little things...

Patient Hand Off to Eternity

Over the last few weeks of teaching I have encountered two repeating themes, patient hand off and end of life issues. The Joint Commission (the accrediting body for hospitals) has put a lot of emphasis on patient hand off recently in an attempt to improve continuity of care for patients during the transition between care providers. I have been thinking of ways to discuss this with my students and provide them opportunities to practice patient reports.
A few weeks ago I found myself standing with a student at the bedside of a patient as he passed. Only days later one of my students found herself caring for an extremely ill developmentally delayed young man who was on deaths door. She did a wonderful job providing competent and compassionate care for the boy but unfortunately he died just a few days later.
I fell asleep Monday night reflecting on the last weeks events and wondering how best to respond to the students difficult questions about death. I awoke at 2:30 am from a very vivid dream. One of my junior students was with me at work in the ICU. We where standing at the foot of that same young man's bed. We had come to the place where we could do no more for this boy. We remained at his bedside as he took his last breath. Then we did something very strange, we clapped. It was a long hard fight coming to a gracious end. As we where clapping the boy took flight right out of the bed. I know; odd, cheesy, disturbing, call it what you will...
After thinking about it for a bit I finally realized what it was all about. As nurses we naturally desire to cure our patients, to make them well. We often take on too much responsibility for them, forgetting that in perspective we really have little offer them. While we must carry out our duties as nurses, we must also remember to daily "hand off" our patients to The Great Physician. Our job is to help help set the stage for God's grace in the forms (likely and unlikely) in which it manifests.

"Called"

The other day one my students asked me if I felt like I was "called" to Rwanda or to Cambodia or to Mexico. Though I genuinely enjoy traveling, cultures and international medicine, I had to admit the answer was 'no'; or at least not specifically. I went to all of those places simply because of open doors.
While I will not deny that God sometimes calls us to specific geographical locations, I believe that more often God is calling us to deeper and deeper places in our faith and in our walk with Him. When our hearts are in the places He calls them, our geographic location matters very little; we cannot help but be a part of His plan.
"Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee." Isaiah 26:3

I'm Choosing to Feel Loved!

Last year the university enforced a new policy that students may no longer call professors and staff by their first names. With a three syllabal last name, I was often called Professor M. One student, however, decided that even that was too long and he began calling me ProM instead. It wasn't long before almost all the students were calling me ProM. It didn't bother me, I don't think it was ever said rudely and I can think of much worse things to be called.
This year I find myself still being called ProM, only this time by former students, new students, the office ladies and even a few fellow professors. I suppose I should feel loved?
Yesterday I went down to the school to make a few copies and do a little cleaning in my office. I went into the nursing student lounge to put some things in the student mailboxes. As I looked up at the white board, I saw this...

I suppose I should be glad that it didn't say "ProM Sucks!"

Living the Dream

This is written version of the schpeal that I gave in chapel on Friday. Of course I don't really read word for word while I'm giving an address but this is pretty close:

Have you ever had a dream? I’m not talking about the "I showed up late for class one day to everyone pointing and laughing only to find out I was in my underwear” sort of dreams. But have you ever had a time in your life where you know God was saying, "Listen up! There's something important here and I want you to pursue it!"

Each person you see is up here because they had that kind of dream and they went for it! For me this dream started in 1996. I was in Mexico for the first time, meeting my neighbor up close and personal, and God planted a dream that I called "the 3M’s:" Mexico medical missions. In Mexico, God showed me a people that He loved -- a people with an openness, a readiness, a connection, and a need that I felt called to work with.

Dreams are processes, in God's kingdom, and the journey is part of living the dream. One of my favorite memories from this trip was a church service one night, where we were all sharing testimonies. It was awesome to see how God had been shaping each of our ideas and circumstances, for all these years, to bring us to this place. The two weeks you're going to hear about are just the tip of the iceberg.

So what was this trip? Our work began in a village called Aldea, where we set up a clinic below a rock quarry to meet the needs of the surrounding community in partnership with a local church. We covered everything from runny noses, to ear infections, to prenatal care. Some of us even cut hair!

We spent the second half of the trip serving with the Red Cross, focusing on trauma patients. Our team had the opportunity to see life in the streets of Mexico City from a medical perspective. We rode in ambulances, dealt with accident victims, sutured wounds, performed CPR and saw firsthand the needs of the city, which extended far beyond just the physical. Even though we were “living our dream,” the work wasn't easy.

It truly was an amazing adventure, but really it's just part of the ultimate journey. God is at work in each of us, bringing us closer and closer to where he wants us to be – and really, that's The Dream that we should be living every day.

Yay!

It's official, NURS 4910 has been approved for credit and will be in the course catalogue for this upcoming summer! The students are extatic, as they should be, they worked VERY hard for this class. Since we've been back three different professors have asked my students to share about their experiences in their classes. I have a lot of juniors already expressing interest. Here goes something...