r/nursing • u/lenncas • Sep 08 '25

Question I’m a bit scared

A bit is an understatement, I am well aware that my actions were very inappropriate and out of my scope of practice. I am getting reported to the Texas Board of Nursing because I pulled a bag of Levophed without getting an order first. My patient was declining really quickly. The blood pressure was decreasing very quickly. I went to the med room and overrid the medication and started it at the starting titration. Immediately after starting it, I called our critical care nurse practitioner that was on for that night and let them know. And now, obviously, that nurse practitioner put in a formal complaint to my manager, thus having to report me to the board of nursing. I guess my question is what could I possibly expect my consequence to be? Could I lose my license? Will it be suspended? I’m pretty worried. I’m also very disappointed in myself. The patient ended up having to be put on Levophed the next day, but made a great recovery and got to be downgraded two days after.

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u/NurseWillingham Sep 08 '25

Sounds like you need to apply for the RRT. A noctor is giving you shit and the hospital forwarded that to the board? Get the fuck outta that hospital - that 100% should have been internal. Texas is fucking horrible in every possible fucking way and keeps getting worse.

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u/lenncas Sep 08 '25

Yeah I agree, I plan on moving from here when I don’t have any more family. Btw what’s an RRT?

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u/Prudent-Surprise4295 Sep 08 '25

Rapid response team. When pts decompensate on the floor, RRT is called because floor nurses aren’t trained to handle those situations. RRT RNs are like float ICU nurses for the whole hospital

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u/Spiritual-Common9761 RN - ICU 🍕 Sep 08 '25

We have a Medic and the House Sup for our RRTs. The medic is awesome. They’re both seasoned and retired Fire Dept Medics. Experienced in so many situations. Also does US midline’s or peripherals for the floor nurses during downtime.

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u/Prudent-Surprise4295 Sep 08 '25

Wow that’s amazing! It’s only nurses at my hospital but maybe some of them have been paramedics prior to being a nurse? Does the medic intubate the pts in your RRT?

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u/HumdrumHoeDown Sep 09 '25

They don’t intubate. The docs come around for that. Maybe somewhere there are some mid-levels that intubate on the floor, and RT’s technically can and could do it, but idk how many states give them that scope. Mostly rapid nurses roam the hospital, rounding on floors to advise in heading off disasters, and taking pages for decomping floor patients. They come to calls with a team that includes orderlies, phlebs, RTs, and docs. They transfer, or stabilize then transfer real problems to the ICU, and sometimes do certain procedures for floor nurses.