Nursing School Testing. Becoming an Awesome Tester!

Transcription

1 Nursing School Testing Becoming an Awesome Tester!

2 Nursing school tests can be a challenge for even the most brilliant mind. Like most tests, the questions are written to see how much information you know about a particular subject. So, you read the book, study the material and show up for the test ready to ace it only to find yourself staring all blinkey-eyed at the first question trying to figure out where in the WORLD this material was located within the book and all your study material. It may not happen on the first test. I was in semester 3 before it happened to me. At some point, no matter how much you devour the material; there will be a test that leaves you feeling like the bajillion hours you just spent in study time were totally wasted. At some point you will feel super-dumb. This is not at all awesome. No worries, we can fix this by retraining your brain in the art of reading a nursing school test question. These are not memorizing material and pick the correct answer out of 5 options sort of tests. These are study the material, read the question, figure out what the professor is asking; know what will keep your patient alive kind of questions. You will be given a scenario and you will need to take in the data, analyze it like a nurse and figure out what a nurse would do before you can even begin to answer the question. For example, you may look at a question that mentions the patient says he has pain that is a 7/10 on the pain scale. The answers choices range include a couple of meds you can give, calling the doctor, assessing respiratory rate, and repositioning the patient. So, you can jump to a quick conclusion that you should give the patient a med, right? I mean that pain is pretty high. Hold up though, the body of the question also gives you lab values that include AST and ALT numbers and tells you that the patient appears groggy when speaking to you; have you considered that before you answer the question? The problem with nursing school questions is that usually more than one of the answer choices could be correct. Whether they are the correct choice or not depends on a lot of things. This is where you really have to analyze the data, look at the consequences of each choice you make and how your actions effect different patient populations before you can figure out which answer is correct for THIS situation. An answer that works for a person with just a broken hip may not be a safe or effective choice for someone with CHF. This is where you get to start to think like a nurse for real, y all. Does the question ask you what to do first? Are the lab values elevated? Are the patients vitals normal? Where are you at in the nursing process? Have you done any other intervention yet? Your quick answer that you just KNEW was right might not have considered these variables that totally change the answer to your question.(lpn s and others with experience get burned by the jump since they know so much about real-world stuff already) No need to get frustrated about this, Nurse Awesome. By the time you get to that first test question you are going to be able to analyze data and find the correct choice for even the craziest questions your Prof throws at you. Let s get started.

3 First things first. One word can change the entire question. Yes, one single word. So get to know these guys and look for them in the questions. These tell you that you are in the assessment phase of the nursing process. The answer you pick will often be the answer that includes you ASSESSING your patient. Ascertain Assess Check Collect Find out Identify Monitor Observe Gather information Recognize These words tell you that you need to prioritize action or steps to answer Best, First or Primary Vital Initial or immediate Essential Most likely or least likely Most appropriate or least appropriate Highest or lowest priority Order of priority At highest risk or At lowest risk Best understanding Next Priority Most important A few more word tricks to get comfy with: Look for the words that are absolutes in the answers. Words like always, never, all, must, or none often make the answer wrong: there are rarely any absolutes in nursing. Look for words that are the extremes in the answers. If you see 2 answers that are the opposite extreme of each other it is likely that neither of them is the best answer for your question. Look for the words in the answers that do not seem to fit with the question. Analyze them before you throw them out. They are often the wrong answer. Look for the words in the answers that seem similar. It is a bit sneaky however; when 2 values both seem correct, one of them is likely the best answer. Look to your question for clues as to which to pick. That depends on where you are in the nursing process and often the answer is the one that keeps your patient safe, alive, happy, etc.

4 Once you have looked for key words in the question stem you need some way to judge what action you should take to help your patient in this question situation. We are going to use the nursing process to help us here. Read the question looking for clues. What phase of the nursing process is the question presenting? Have you assessed + now you are being asked to diagnose? Have you assessed, diagnosed + now you are being asked to intervene? Have you done all of these+ now you are being asked to evaluate your action? You will get many more questions right is you get in the habit of asking yourself on every question: Did I assess already? If so, what is my assessment data telling me? Did I diagnose already? If so, what intervention should I perform based on the diagnosis? Did I perform an intervention? If so, was it successful? Remember, awesome nurses do not take action until they have gathered all the data they can on the patient. If you pick an answer that asks you to intervene and the question tells you nothing about assessment data you will be choosing wrong (unless the patient is bleeding out). You must always gather data on the patient before you take an action. Nursing school is filled with rules and exceptions to them. Get comfy with the idea that there are going to be exceptions. Follow the steps of the nursing process and assess first, BUT use your critical thinking skills here. If it is an emergency situation and you need to do an intervention as the priority BECAUSE LIFE IS IN DANGER then this answer is the one you should select! If your question says the patient is bleeding-do something to stop it. If your question says the patient is not breathing-do something to help him breathe If your question says your patients is seizing-keep him safe and stop his seizing. You must get in the habit of looking for the question to tell you where you are in the nursing process, dig? When you are analyzing all that question data you may as well figure out where they are in Maslow s Hierarchy of Needs + Erikson s Stages of Development. This is particularly useful on those questions that are touchy-feely. It seems so disconnected when you study these. I mean you learn them then you are done and there are few direct questions about them after that first test. Trust me on this, you will use it both your entire career; not just in school or on the NCLEX. They can help you if you have no clue where to start. These things might help as well.

5 If you are really stumped on a question Try these What is the least restrictive/least invasive option? Visualize yourself doing the procedure before choosing an answer. If the question describes a client situation that is not life-threatening and there is an option that relates directly to a nursing action relevant to the situation then this is the correct answer. Not the one that says call the physician...even though you may call the doc but unless life is in danger do something to intervene first! Do not read into questions if you start thinking what-if you are not reading the question. When choosing an answer look only at the data in the question! What can the nurse do independently? What needs doc order? Ask yourself; can I do this as the nurse? These questions want to know what you can do as a nurse to keep your patient safe. If you have chosen Call the Doc as your answer analyze again before you make that your final answer. Ensure that ALL parts of the answer you pick are correct. Be alerted that you need to do this when the word AND is inside the answer. Remember that on the NCLEX and most likely on your school exams it is assumed that you have all the needed materials and resources available at the client bedside. If it seems that there is more than one correct options ask; is there a global answer-one that encompasses the other options. Some options may include the others; this is often the case when you see answers that really seem like there is more than one correct response and you cannot narrow it down based on Maslow s, Erikson s or Nursing Process. When a physiological need does not exist then safety needs take precedence So there it is my friends. I wish someone had shared these tidbits with me before I started testing. I know that in the midst of all the other stuff school will ask you to do that it seems like a huge pain to try and incorporate any of this stuff into your testing skills bank. It is a pain. Even if only on practice exams, ask yourself these questions. They will become second-nature to you and help you get many more questions right than not on your theory exams and on the NCLEX. Best of all, you are teaching your brain to think like a nurse; a skill that all awesome nurses need! I still use the nursing process a lot in my daily work in the ICU so learning it backward and forward was useful for me long after testing was done. As an aside here: If you find yourself having a super-tough time figuring out how read and interpret the questions on your exams after you have practiced using the stuff above then please, go to a professor and get some help. The self-doubt that creeps into your noggin when you study hard and do poorly on tests in spite of it can totally kill your drive to succeed in school. Last thing here. Be easy on yourself while you are learning. It can take more than a second to get really good at answering nursing-type questions. IF you do poorly on a test or two do not take that as a sign that your entire nursing career is doomed. Even a great tester in the general subjects can snag up on these kinds of questions. Lots of times it isn t that you failed to study it is just that you failed to understand what exactly the question was asking. That is all. I know you can be an awesome test taker, Nurse Awesome!

6 Cliffs Notes Version for the Chronically Busy Nursing Student Breathe Read the question Look for key words in the question. Underline them. Look for the words that tell you which part of the nursing process you are in at the moment. Look for data values and vital signs. Underline them. Look for clues as to the disease process in the question and then the answer. See if you have an idea of the answer before you look at the answer choices. Look at the choices. Do you see one that matches what you thought before you looked at the answer? Ask yourself on each individual answer; will this help fix my issue? Will this keep my patient safe? Is there an answer that I better choose because it is the one that saves my patient s life? Ask yourself on each answer; do ALL parts of this answer help my patient? If one piece of the answer is incorrect the whole answer is incorrect. Read the question again with your answer tacked on the end of it. Does this help your patient? Does your answer make sense? Do not erase answers once you have worked systematically thru the question. Celebrate your accomplishment! Let go of the outcome. Stressing about a test that is done will not help you on future testing.

7 I do this work because I love nursing but hated the process of becoming a nurse. I want your way to be easier so you can focus on other things that are more important in school. You are welcome to share this pdf with your fellow students. The more the merrier in this party. Share it but give me credit for creating it. It came from my brain, my heart, my observation, my practice. It is super-bad karma to steal stuff and not at all awesome to claim it as your own when it is not. Nursing school is a big enough monster without bringing the I steal shit pox on yourself. Thanks in advance. Now, go be awesome!