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Environment > Medical/Surgical Services
We
provide Medical/Surgical services on the third floor,
fourth floor and fifth floor of the Medical Center. Our
third-floor unit has 39 beds, our fourth-floor unit has
14 beds and our fifth-floor unit has 24 beds. On our
fifth-floor unit, we have 16 telemetry monitors.
A central monitor at the nurse's station tracks information
from each patient. Patients on our third-floor unit can
also be monitored by telemetry, with the monitoring done
from the nurse's station on the Critical Care Unit.
Patient populations: Our third-,
fourth- and fifth-floor units serve patients of all
ages including medical/surgical, cardiac, oncology
and orthopedics. Our pediatric patients receive services
on the third floor.
Services/treatments offered: The services we
provide to our patients are determined by the reason
for their hospitalization. These services include helping
patients recover from surgeries so they can be discharged
home or transferred for further care, providing IV therapy
for patients requiring antibiotics and educating patients
and families regarding new onsets of illnesses, especially
stroke, diabetes and congestive heart failure. We also
observe patients while they are waiting on tests and
X-rays to provide a diagnosis of their illness.
Work environment: Team-focused approach to delivering
patient care. Close, trusting relationship among staff.
Many of the nurses on our three units are recent nursing
graduates or have less than 10 years of experience.
Skill mix: Our units are staffed by RNs and LPNs as well as student
nurses working as PCTs, who use that experience to learn patient care
while preparing for their nursing licenses. RNs assess all patients on
our three units and coordinate their plan of care. Nurses work as a team
with physicians, case managers, social workers, pharmacists, dietitians,
rehabilitation staff, respiratory therapists and radiology technologists
in providing care to each patient. A monitor tech staffs our fifth-floor
unit 24 hours daily. Some of the nurses on our units are certified as
medical/surgical nurses. We encourage our nurses to continually further
their education. We require our nurses in the Medical/Surgical area to
be certified in
Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS), Pediatric Advanced Life Support
(PALS) and chemotherapy administration, depending on which unit they
work.
Other information about the units: We treat our patients
like they are members of our own families and maintain open communication
with our patients' family members. As new technology, new services
and new drugs become available, we are constantly learning something
new. Our nurses are conscientious about the care they provide and
about making sure that patients and families are satisfied with
the care provided.
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