The Foley

It's eluded me for over a year now. But finally, today of all days, minutes before my clinical round was to come to its end, I inserted my first foley catheter. Yes! This was the moment I was waiting for. This was the moment that I will look back on and say, "That's when I made it. That was my homecoming. That... was the day I became a nurse." Ok, maybe not. Actually, that day will come when I prove a doctor wrong. hehe

So I inserted my foley. It wasn't so bad and not too difficult. But it wasn't fun for my patient. He was about 84 and already in some pain, so I just made a bad day worse coming from his perspective. Anyway, the procedure is sterile, meaning that you have to open everything in a certain way, put on sterile gloves at a specific time, and make sure you don't touch anything that is non-sterile until you're ready to do so (like the sexual organ of your patient). You clean the area with idodine. Make sure your foley catheter is working properly (a balloon inflates with water at the tip once it's inserted; this prevents it from dislodging or moving back and forth which can lead to infection).

Then you lubricate your foley. Um... actually... I lubricated the inside of his urethral meatus. Yeah. I actually injected his member with lubricant. I was told to do this by my instructor. I thought she was crazy, it makes sense. It probably was a lot less irritating when I shoved inside past the prostate, which was probably a little larger than normal due to his age. Not much urine came out though; he's in end-stage renal failure.

Well, that was today's highlight. I also gave my first nicotine patch today and gave two injections (insulin and lovenox, an anticoagulant). Life is changing so quickly. Last year I was scared to be in the hospital. Now I feel like it's my home away from home. God has really done a big work in me to get me this far. But I digress. I'm gonna have some pizza now and do some work so I have the weekend off. Shan and I are driving to El Centro to hang out with my parents on Saturday. Yah!