u/thrownursingaway

Doing this out of desperation as I'm such an unlucky person and can't work with someone frequently enough to vouch for me. Every shift I work is in a different hospital and/or different ward, sometimes I only return to the same hospital once in 2-3 months. I'm being floated literally everywhere. Other times the shift I sign up for cancels on me 2 hours before and I don't get to decide what happens.

I've just passed the 100-hour mark since starting work. My goal is 1040 hours by mid-2027.

The two wards I've returned to - everyone looks different and no one remembers me because the last time I worked with them was 2 months ago. The turnover of their staff in that ward is already so bad that more than 50% of the staff in the ward are from the hospital's casual pool and 30% agency. I usually do weekends and afternoon/night shifts so I don't see any nurse educators or NUM around. There is literally no one who can attest to my work except maybe the TL for the shift, who has no time to bother with me.

I'm so disappointed and heartbroken. It's almost impossible to network (and not the time to) during a shift. I'm grabbing at every chance yet I can't get allocated back to the ward where I met that nice CN/TL to exchange contacts with him because I just keep getting cancelled on. I have booked in monday night with the hopes of meeting that TL again but I'm pretty sure they're going to cancel on me again.

My applications with QH are just being outright rejected without any communication. I've emailed in to ask for feedback with no reply. The listing is put up by the central staffing team and there is no name or email or contact number. It's like I've been locked out forever. I can't even update my application with more recent information. Things are starting to look quite hopeless.

I would appreciate if I could somehow network and make friends or find a mentor from QLD/AU on here. I just need a referee that badly. I don't want to resort to illegal means or paying someone to pose as my supervisor. It just sucks how no one wants to take a chance on me if I don't have the two golden referees that they want. My friends in nursing are my peers, not my supervisor. I've not met anyone yet who holds a conversation beyond "how's it going" during shift. I don't trust anyone at my previous workplace (2 years ago) after my work senior backstabbed me and gave me a bad reference that made me lose the job offer with QH.

Yes, maybe me not having work referees is a red flag. but why is a referee a non-negotiable disqualifying requirement in a job application? Why must the referee be my direct work supervisor and it can't be educational or HR? What about those from hospitals with no-referee policies? My direct work supervisor and everyone who was higher-ranking than me were abusive and they are the reason why I left. I had a willing referee from a senior EN however QH rejected this saying that referee was 'not high ranking enough'.

I don't know anymore... I want things to change but it seems like nothing's within my control.

edit: for clarity

Just alighted from a R589 from loganlea to boggo and the bus driver was COMPLETELY LOST. Many cars honked and I realised he was slowing down in the middle of the road to ask the passenger in front which direction he should go.

He was hitting a few kerbs while turning at the junction and then I went up and realised he was trying to drive with his left hand and read the clipboard with his right hand, and he was not even looking at the road ahead. He couldn’t check the oncoming traffic when turning and I had to wipe the glass door for him to see due to the morning mist, that’s when I realised he wasn’t using his mirrors either. Throughout the ride myself and another passenger had tell him where to turn and where to stop.

He missed the turn into the busway and we ended up not being able to make any u-turns or go-arounds. That’s when he decided to turn through a petrol station. And his judgement of a bus turning radius was awful, he thought he was driving a car. he almost knocked over the petrol kiosk before we screamed at him.

He then went over a few more kerbs and whacked three street signs before finally making it to the busway. After finally getting him onto the busway he couldn’t recognise any of the stops closer all the way to Boggo Road and was asking us “which stop is this?” “Do I stop here?” at every stop.

We alighted at boggo and I watched him whack another street sign and park on the busway. I raised my concern to a security guard and one of the train staff in vests, told them that the bus driver needs help, and seems like he’s not fit to drive, I’m worried about safety. The lady stonewalled me and did nothing. I saw him take a roundabout, alight and go to the toilet. I asked him if he’s still gonna continue driving and he said “yeh”. And then he continued driving in the opposite direction…

Edit: unfortunately as I was using my phone to open google maps for him I didn’t get a pic of the licence number. I was just so relieved to alight because it seemed like this bus driver woke up today and decided it was GTA. Or maybe he was on something, or had a long night. I don’t know.

Edited to add: I’VE CALLED TRANSITLINK and they told me they’ll get back within 10 BUSINESS DAYS! :)

Lets hope everyone is safe meanwhile

legitimately asking out of curiosity. I'm a agency medical nurse usually covering onco/AMU/gen med/MH and often get rejected from surgical inpatient shifts saying I "don't have the experience". I probably am salty about this but I want to ask, what exactly are the skills needed for surgical nursing? How is it so different from what I do on the medical ward?

I was thinking that a ward would at least accept a general medical RN if they're desperate enough for someone to fill in a shift but no, they want surgically-trained RNs. So what exactly does surgical training comprise?

I'd learnt and performed in placements pre and post-surgical monitoring, neurovascular charting, surgical wound care, patient controlled analgesia, removal of stitches/staples, watching for complications etc., I thought that would be enough? Sometimes I would have medical patients in my ward undergo surgery and that is all I've experienced, is there something else I'm missing?

Or is the criteria just getting tighter because supply is now enough to meet the demand?

Why do they call it med-surg if surg is so different from med?

Move into the same unit together. Living together (even if it’s just for a few months) shows you the ugly side of people.

I live with a sinkie housemate looking for love and the red flags I see (and am terrified to find out) are:

- never washing the toilet or sink
- peeing on toilet seat
- peeing around toilet bowl
- when asked to clean his mess, he defensively makes an excuse like “your hair on the floor is worse”
- putting trash in my shelf instead of throwing away
- helping himself to my household items without asking (soap etc)
- not paying me back for shared groceries even though previously agreed
- using my groceries that he did not pay for
- helping himself to my food in the fridge without asking
- NEVER once clearing the kitchen trash/recyclables even though the chute is just outside the unit
- makes insulting/judging comments (e.g. why you wear like that?)

Ladies, if your man does this, he does not deserve you.

Seems like this single housemate of mine is never gonna find his partner.

Confused af. For context i’m a nurse and med student and I really hope i dont become like this gastro specialist.

Initially he did basic bloods and stools and all were fine. Didn’t rule out food allergies. Assumed diagnosis was ibs. He threw me probiotics after probiotics. I tried every probiotic on the shelf. No help. I had the nagging feeling that something was wrong on top of the IBS. The doc dismissed me and said there’s nothing he could do. He said “maybe it’s your anxiety or stress” after seeing I had a medical record of depression and anxiety. Great. I couldn’t disprove him because IBS is correlated with depression and anxiety is correlated with IBS. I stopped following up with him because I decided he was too useless and he already told me there is no cure.

Went to another gastro specialist for second opinion. Told her I felt the previous doc missed something and this is more than just IBS. She took a look at my medical records. Also didn’t rule out food allergies. Agreed with previous doc it was IBS. Wrote a wholeass medical report about it.

I had a lecture in school about lactose intolerance. My classmate convinced me to try. I ordered a lactose breath test, it was obvious from the moment I swallowed the lactose, I gagged and my stomach churned so hard, my body wanted me to vomit it all out. Ran to the toilet 5 times that day. Results were out, the severe malabsorption treshold was >80ppm. Mine was 133.

Cut off lactose and milk from my diet, resolved 90% of symptoms. Presented the results to the doc and they were like “oh but given your symptoms I still think you have IBS” c’mon…….

Hey intl student with social anxiety here, in my culture we just start a phone call with Hi and say whatever you’ve gotta say. I’m still trying to get used to answering “how are you” by strangers because the question is personal to me and my answer is not genuine, I get uncomfortable haha.

I was recently calling someone as part of my job search for example, or a clinic for appointment scheduling, is it rude to not start the call with “how are you”?

Am looking for a cheap and convenient option to learn violin as I wanna join one of UQ’s orchestra lol. I do have a piano background but due to brainrot I have forgotten a lot.

If anyone here is a bus driver or works for transport could I ask a very random question, if two buses of the same number come to my stop (busway) at the same time, and the first bus is more crowded than the second, do controllers always get the second bus to slow down and first bus to hurry up?

I’ve seen certain instances where the second bus just overtook the first bus that was boarding at the station so I was wondering if there is a standard procedure or if I take the second bus will it be crawling on the road. Thanks!