Back to School aka Crap You Need.

Back to School Shopping

or

Stuff that I *NEEDED* to get me through School/Clinicals/Life this past year

Stuff I bought, borrowed, and otherwise acquired, and would recommend you do the same…..

As a Student:

• ·         Netbook computer with added RAM (that’s memory for you non-geek types).
• ·         Open Office (word processing suite) that is a free, safe download if you don’t have free Microsoft Office available to you from your University IT Department. My U also provided me with a free copy of Windows 7.  Ask around and see what your exorbitant tuition might include.
• ·         Smart phone
• ·         Smart phone apps, such as Davis’ Drug Guide (which comes free when you buy the book), Epocrates, and Resident Helper.  Resident Helper has all the normal lab values and what the different labs tell us.  REALLY great.
• ·         Wireless mouse for the Netbook.  Ups your productivity by at least 50%.
• ·         A free account with Dropbox or Box.net   Both of these are online storage in the cloud.  Put another way, quit carrying around your antiquated, easily lost flash drives, jump drives, thumb drives, memory stick, etc.  Store your files in the cloud where they cannot be lost or stolen (well, not too easily anyway) and if you’ve got internet, you can access all your files EVERYWHERE.  You won’t even realize how important that is until you start using them.
• ·         Springpad.  Also free.  This is the best task manager, to-do list, place to upload important documents AND tag them for easily searching for them again later, and it all resides in the cloud.  Springpad takes a second to set up, I’ll be honest, but you can make it as complicated or as easy as you want.  I would NEVER have made it through nursing school without it reminding me of when everything was due.  I set all my reminders to the day before.  They even push notifications to your iPhone, and I’m sure to Droid as well.  Free.  We like free, don’t we, poor-nursing-boys-and-girls?

Stuff you need for Clinicals aka actually getting to practice Nursing:

• ·         Okeeffe’s “Working Hands” hand cream.  A little dab is enough.  Latex-compatible (if your facility is stupid enough to still use latex).  Very important to keep your skin in good shape, just like we do for our patients.  Too many buggies in the hospital, just waiting to invade a split in a fingerpad or abrasion of the palm.
• ·         Littman Lightweight II SE stethoscope.  Cheap. I paid <$50.  I can hear pretty well with it. Doesn’t break my neck when it is resting there, and doesn’t hurt my ears when I’m doing my assessments.  I’m even sticking with it after school.
• ·         Ryka tennis shoes for women.  Very nice for we girls and our typical over-pronation problems.  Check ‘em out.
• ·         DANSKOs.  These aren’t ‘comfy’ shoes.  They have a very rigid arch.  But if I don’t wear ‘em, at the end of the day, my feet, knees, and back are killing me.  They just take a little bit of a learning curve.  Completely different than what Americans are accustomed to, shoe-wise.
• ·         Non-stick bandage scissors.  Look on Amazon.com  About $15.  Wish I’d had them all year long.
• ·         Your own pair of hemostats.  No, you’re not going to be clamping vessels.  But you are going to see how handy they are for disconnecting IVs that have somehow clamped themselves to the pump.  Or taking pesky tubing off the IV still in your patient’s arm when they need “hep-locked” for a bath or for PT. Or Or Or.
• ·         Rewetting drops for you contact lens wearers.  When you are running up and down the halls at top speed as you will be doing during clinicals, your lenses will catch all that air and dry out.  Or invariably, something will get between your eye and your contact.  Have the stuff in your kit. Seriously.
• ·         Burt’s Bees chapstick. Even comes in colors now.  Nice to have a hint of color without having full makeup on.  I’m not against full makeup in the hospital, but…many nurses you work with will look at you pretty suspiciously if you come too ‘pretty-girl.’  A little mascara and a hint of color on the lips is enough, and is professional.
• ·         Imitrex.  That is gold for you migraine-sufferers.  I’ve had ‘em for the last, I dunno, 15+ years.  Keep one in your pocket.  Don’t broadcast it.  If you start to get your warning signs or aura, go to the bathroom and take it.  You can’t miss clinicals, and your instructors don’t need to know you’re taking meds.  It’s not a narcotic, for god’s sake, and it will keep you acting as a safe nurse, instead of a headache-impaired-nurse.

Stuff that I just like, in general:

• ·         Toms shoes.  Aren’t they fun?  And our materialism is slightly mediated by the donations they make, so yay!
• ·         Burt’s Bees Milk & Honey lotion.  Fab Fab Fab!  And any other assorted Burts products are generally on my fav list.
• ·         Germ X hand sanitizer.  I like that brand because it smells good.  Not all of them do.
• ·         My Keurig coffee maker.  Can’t get through nursing school without a daily caffeine infusion.  I love Newmans Own in coffee and Celestial Seasoning’s tea.
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And Oh yeah…get an Amazon Prime account!  Totally important.  And they give it to you free or cheap when you start school and sign up with your school email addy.  Do it.  Textbooks are cheaper on Amazon than at your bookstore.  You can have a textbook shipped to you in only TWO DAYS for free after your Prime membership fee.  Or OVERNIGHTED for only $4.  This will save your ass sometime, trust me.

Happy Back to School Shopping!