This class was taken during the fall semester of my Junior year. This might honestly be one of my favorite classes that I have taken here at Longwood. This was a nursing class I selected to enhance for honors credit upon successful completion of the course.
This course focused SOLEY on medications that are used in nursing……which is ALL of them. Lord have mercy, never in my wildest imagination did I think existed SO MANY MEDS!
This class was by far one of the most intimidating classes I have taken. The amount of content that we covered was truly mind-boggling. Luckily the professor was FANTASTIC and taught the material in a way where her students could keep up and digest the content.
This was an intriguing class for me because it opened a lot of curiosity doors for me. Obviously medications are a secret weapon for healthcare to tackle most issues encountered, but the amount of care needing to be taken when administering medications is what caught me off guard. How one administers medications, when one administers medications, whether you’re taking a medication with or without food, what you eat/drink after you take a medication, all of these factors have a major impact on most medications that I did not realize. Medications are so incredibly important when taking care of patients! Medications are honestly one of the best inventions man has ever created. Medications come with great responsibility however.
Medications all fall under different classifications. Each classification of medications have differing effects on the body. Understanding what condition the patient is suffering from is crucial to determining which medication to use, however, each medication class has its own set of medication considerations. Medication considerations are simply considerations that nurses must keep in the back of their minds before they administer medications. These considerations include things like whether the medication needs to be taken with or without food, what type of side effects the medication will cause, how quickly the medication takes effects, patient allergies, etc.
For the enhancement project of this class, I decided to combine this and my nutrition class’ enhancement into one project. My partner and I decided to select several medications that we were learning in this class and completely break down everything that a patient would need to know about that medication. We included drug classifications, foods that would positively and negatively interact with that medication, detailed descriptions of the pathophysiology of why the medication was effective, symptoms that would warrant the use of that medication/incorporating certain foods into your diet, and many more factors.
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1sgfYIy00cJgLhMPbHaU7TIRa4XmPq7EH2niGcXJtJoc/edit?usp=sharing
Above is the link to my presentation for my Nutrition and Pharmacology Enhancement! Feel free to flick through.
This class was one of my favorites because it truly showed me how quickly and effectively nurses can help their patients. My grandmother has a plethora of health issues, yet luckily she has a medication for each one that helps her function and remain independent. Passing this class made me feel like a real nurse!