Can anyone tell me?

Why one of the nurses I work with seems to not want to be on record in the pixis? She always asks someone else to get meds for her patients regardless of how busy we are. I can't quite figure it out, she will let her patient suffer until someone has the time to medicate the patient for her rather than just get the med out herself. It isn't laziness, it is something beyond that, I am sure, I just don't know what.
Is she scared to make a med mistake? I'm not even a nurse yet and I was laying in bed last night thinking do I really want to be a nurse and be responsible for someone's meds. It freaks me out but I have learned over 30 meds from my son since he has been born and give at least 6 to him daily, so I'm sure I can learn it but it still freaks me out thinking about giving them to patients.

Does she have a Pyxis code? Could it be she has made an error on purpose or not, and is not allowed without a witness? Otherwise management must handle this and soon. It's unfair to her patients. It's unfair to put more work on her coworkers.

That is absolutely unacceptable! How long has she been getting away with this?Obviously management needs to deal with this promptly. As one of my managers once said to me...."I can't manage what I don't know."

Is that legal? Uh..no! Something's fishy in Denmark! Why would anyone sign out and chart a med as given, if it is really given by someone else? Or...is it being given at all? hmmm...are there narcotics involved? I'd report her immediately. Yowza!

I have seen this only once before. The nurse that I was working with (I was orienting with her as a float pool nurse at a temp job I started) could NOT administer narcotics because she was in some sort of "return to work" program after being admitted to drug/alcohol rehab. She could NOT administer her own narcotics. Another nurse had to pull the drugs out of the Pyxis for her and actually give them to her patient. She could do the assessment of the patient's pain and decide what to give, but she couldn't actually handle the narcotics. Is this nurse actually giving her drugs? If not, I would suspect something like this. If she has no reason to not handle narcotics, I would guess she is seriously in violation of policy ---> or more likely what she is doing is asking other nurses to violate policy. Where I work (and I think this is pretty standard) you can NOT pull narcs out for another nurse due to narcotic tracking issues. ONE nurse needs to pull out drugs for ONE patient, administer it to the SAME patient, and DOCUMENT it. If that procedure isn't followed, narcs are apt to fly out of the Pyxis all over the place. My facility tracks Pyxis usage and where the meds are getting documented. If you aren't giving the meds you pulled out to the patient you said you pulled them out for (or somebody else documents giving the med), those are big huge red flags for the narcotic police.

Reading this again -- I would suspect diversion. Her not accessing the Pyxis is an attempt not to get caught anywhere near narcs. Definitely report this.

If you haven't brought this to the attention of your manager, now is the time.There is something very fishy here, and she is wasting everyone's time.

Quote from missbecky2006I have seen this only once before. The nurse that I was working with (I was orienting with her as a float pool nurse at a temp job I started) could NOT administer narcotics because she was in some sort of "return to work" program after being admitted to drug/alcohol rehab. She could NOT administer her own narcotics. Another nurse had to pull the drugs out of the Pyxis for her and actually give them to her patient. She could do the assessment of the patient's pain and decide what to give, but she couldn't actually handle the narcotics. Is this nurse actually giving her drugs? If not, I would suspect something like this. If she has no reason to not handle narcotics, I would guess she is seriously in violation of policy ---> or more likely what she is doing is asking other nurses to violate policy. Where I work (and I think this is pretty standard) you can NOT pull narcs out for another nurse due to narcotic tracking issues. ONE nurse needs to pull out drugs for ONE patient, administer it to the SAME patient, and DOCUMENT it. If that procedure isn't followed, narcs are apt to fly out of the Pyxis all over the place. My facility tracks Pyxis usage and where the meds are getting documented. If you aren't giving the meds you pulled out to the patient you said you pulled them out for (or somebody else documents giving the med), those are big huge red flags for the narcotic police.

RED FLAG... diversion, the meds, although the scheduled ones come out on you, there might be pain meds, ambien, PRN's..... RED flag. NEVER do this, because if you pull them, you MUST administer them to ensure the 5 rights and ensure that they are being given. Just say NOOOOOooooooooo.

Why don't you ask her why?

Quote from realnursealso/LPNWhy don't you ask her why?

something sounds fishy to me as well, it should be reported to your NM