Bryan Trinh

7/7/16
At the final stage of preceptorship,, I am fully taking on a four patient load with little
assistance from my preceptor. At this point I am feeling like one of the team and am a lot more
comfortable on my unit and am really considering a job at the VA and hopefully a med surg floor
as great as this one. My preceptor has said my time management skills and organization have
greatly improved since day one and she admires my critical thinking and interpersonal skills. She
also likes how I check on patients frequently and respect that anything can happen within the
hospital, so it is important to always be aware.
The last day of preceptorship was going pretty well, but there was one patient I had that I
knew I needed to keep an eye on. He was an older man who was admitted to the floor prior to hip
surgery. He was hard of hearing, didnt have his glasses and on top of that slightly confused and
forgetful. On the bright side he was a very nice man. Since Im providing full care for my
patients now, I check on them very frequently because I dont want anything bad to happen on
my watch. Luckily I was constantly providing patient care because as I was checking on my
patient for possibly the second time in thirty minutes, I noticed him trying to climb out of bed. I
immediately ran to prevent him from almost falling out of bed.
He was confused and I had to reorientate him to place and time. Even though I was
freaking out I presented myself as calm and collective to hopefully calm the patient, which it did.
He finally snapped out of his confusion and I repeatedly reminded him where he was and to not
attempt to leave the bed and to always call for help if needed.

This situation could have been very critical if the patient fell. He could have suffered
numerous injuries that could even lead to death. I had no time to think or get help. My priority
was patient safety and to quickly prevent him from falling. After assuring the patient was safe I
notified my patient of the situation and suggested a possible sitter for him because of the fall risk
due to his confusion. Luckily we had an extra tech on the floor that volunteered to watch the
patient until he was transported to surgery later that day.
I felt like I did the best I could do in such a predicament that required action over
thinking. Even though I did panic a little bit, I didnt let that effect how I cared for my patient.
Im really glad I was making such frequent rounds on my patients or the situation could have
been really bad. Im also happy that I was able to advocate for my patients safety and that my
intervention went through for the patient.

References
Quigley, P., White, S. (May 31, 2013). Hospital-Based Fall Program Measurement and
Improvement in High Reliability Organizations. The Online Journal of Issues in Nursing Vol. 18,
No. 2, Manuscript 5. DOI: 10.3912/OJIN.Vol18No02Man05