What strategies do you use to shield yourself from negative emotions from patients and ensure that your confidence and performance as a nurse remain unaffected?
I talk to God a lot and ask Him to help me and others.
I remind myself that they are ill, not themselves due to pain, strange environment, etc, and have faith in my abilities as a nurse. If a patient is emotionally abusive, ask for an assignment change or debrief with a colleague. Sometimes you just need a safe space to scream. But never in front of the patient. I also had a person I could always talk the situation thru with who was a nurse and had had some of the same experiences. A lot of times I would pray before entering the room, that the patient would not act out. We each must find our own ways of coping but that does not mean a patient can abuse the nurse in any manner.
Have a good sense of humor to get through nursing.
Take time to look & see things that you might not know.
Everyone you meet brings something to the table - learn from
Them even if it's what not to do. Good luck!
This is just my own personal experience and opinion, so feel free to take it or leave it. 😉 but after grinding through COVID as a floor nurse and know an OR nurse, I’ve began to learn that most often your patients are scared, in pain or have other outside influences and experiences that are being expressed to us as their primary nurse.
It’s probably 95-99% not even associated with you personally. But unfortunately, we are an easy target. So just I listen, calmly explain that I’m here to help support them and do my best to care for them. And leave it at that. You take a few deep breaths and tell yourself “yiu got this” because you do.