Clinicals...Finished!!!

For those of you who are new to my life...I recently completed the nursing program at BYU-Idaho. It was a lot of work, tears, and joy as well. The following are some pictures of the last day of clinicals. Clinicals are the way nursing students get their experience. We go to a hospital, take care of 1-2 patients, and practice being nurses. These clinical shifts started when I was first in the program September 2008 and continued until November 21st 2009. We went once a week, mostly on Saturdays for 12 hour shifts. This makes a long Saturday! We went to Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center for two semesters and Madison Memorial Hospital for two semesters. So here goes...

This is the walk we made each and every Saturday morning for two semesters. The only difference was that it was almost always in the dark(we had to be there by 6:30am and didn't leave until 6 or 7pm).
This is how I look at 6:30 in the morning. Keep in mind that we lived in Rexburg about a 45 min drive from Idaho Falls where the hospital was! This means waking up at 5am after a Friday night!


These are some of my fellow nursing students. You can tell how excited we are at 6:30am! Actually, this being the last day we were ecstatic!

This is the much feared and dreaded and even hated Nursing Care Worksheet (affectionately known as an NCW by nursing students)! I have spent probably 50 hours doing NCWs. It is a worksheet done on patients in clincial and includes assessment data, medications, lab tests, and nursing diagnoses.This is at the end of the last clinical day. We got out a few hours early which was fun. This is Marybeth and me. We were thrilled. I could never have made it through the program without Marybeth. We had a lot of fun together and we also shared some tough experiences. She always helped me when I was behind at clincials. Everyone needs a friend like Marybeth!
Jumping for joy!!!

This is the final walk from the EIRMC building. I think the smile on my face says it all. It was a great feeling to be done. The next time I enter a hospital I plan on being paid for my work!