I have been attending nursing clinicals since my spring semester of Sophomore year. My first clinical rotation was at the medical-surgical unit at Centra Southside Hospital in Farmville. I was very nervous for my first clinical, but by the end of it I felt much more confident with basic nursing skills. I got to practice in the real world how to take vitals, talk to patients, provide bed baths, and attend to call bells. I also learned how to document on a hospital charting system.

My second clinical rotation was in the fall semester of my Junior year. It was on a medical-surgical floor at Bon Secours Southside Medical Hospital in Petersburg. Here, I did the same skills as before, but felt much more confident in doing them and could do a more efficient job. I also was able to give medications a few times. This was beneficial to administer medications to a real person and apply my lab knowledge to real life.

My spring semester Junior year I attended two clinicals. One of them was on the medical-surgical floor at the Farmville hospital that I attended Sophomore year. I was able to give many more medications and do more advanced skills, like insert IVs, draw blood, and insert a urinary catheter. I felt much more confident in my medication administration skills and was grateful to begin practicing more advanced skills. I even got to to post-mortem care on a deceased body. My other rotation was on the labor and delivery floor at Bon Secours St. Francis Hospital in Richmond. I was very nervous for this one because I worried seeing a live birth would make me faint or throw up. However, I actually loved seeing my first birth and thought it was completely magical. I was amazed at the whole process and really enjoyed being a part of bringing a baby into the world. It was really interesting to care for mothers and newborns since I had only cared for geriatric patients before. I really enjoyed caring for the babies and doing the physical assessments on them. I had to change my whole way of thinking and assessing to work with the babies. I also got to spend a day in the neonatal intensive care unit. There, I administered breast milk boluses through a nasogastric tube to the newborns and got to assess the babies’ vitals. I felt that both clinicals that year really taught me a lot and helped me feel more ready to be a nurse myself.