Skip to ContentGo to accessibility page
Medical-Surgical Nursing

What Should the Nurse Do?

Medical-Surgical NursingWhat Should the Nurse Do?

What Should the Nurse Do?

1 .
You have completed a comprehensive physical and history assessment on a young patient with whom you have developed a good rapport. You are leaving at the end of your shift and say goodbye. The patient asks you if you will be their nurse tomorrow. You answer honestly that you never know what your assignment will be the day before. The patient states that they would like to request you as their nurse so they can get to know you better, and asks if the two of you could have coffee in the cafeteria tomorrow. If you were the nurse, what would you do?
2 .
A nurse in a busy ER enters the room of a patient who presents with a broken wrist. The patient is in pain and becomes impatient as the nurse begins to ask questions. How should the nurse respond when the patient asks, “Can’t you just look this all up in my medical record?”
3 .
An 88-year-old patient on the med-surg unit fell in their room after trying to get from bed to the bathroom without assistance. What safety and surroundings assessment components related to the patient’s home environment could have helped prevent this incident?
Citation/Attribution
Reuse and redistribution of this content in digital or print format:
  • This book may not be used in the training of large language models or otherwise be ingested into large language models or generative AI offerings without OpenStax's prior written permission.
  • This book uses the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License, which means that you can reuse and modify the material only for noncommercial purposes, must attribute OpenStax, and must distribute any derivative works under the same license.
  • Any commercial printing of this textbook, including using a local or custom printer, must be approved by OpenStax, and proper citation provided.
  • OpenStax-copyrighted images, activities, assessments, and similar components of this book are subject to the same licensing – CC-BY-NC-SA. They can be used for noncommercial purposes with attribution. Commercial use requires permission.
  • Permission requests: Anyone who intends to incorporate this content (including text, images, and other components) into large language models, use it in AI offerings, use it commercially (including in print), and/or has questions about another use case is welcome to complete our reuse request form.
Attribution information
  • If you are redistributing all or part of this book in a noncommercial print format, then you must include on every physical page the following attribution:

    Access for free at https://openstax.org/books/medical-surgical-nursing/pages/1-introduction

  • If you are redistributing all or part of this book in a noncommercial digital format, then for every page that includes OpenStax content, you must license the derivative work under the same CC-BY-NC-SA license as the original, and include on every digital page view the following attribution:

    Access for free at https://openstax.org/books/medical-surgical-nursing/pages/1-introduction

Citation information

The information below includes the information needed to generate citations in most major styles (APA, MLA, etc.); you must reformat and organize the information as needed to fit the requirements of the style. Use the information below to generate a citation. We recommend using a citation tool such as this one.

© Jul 23, 2026 OpenStax. Textbook content produced by OpenStax is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License. The OpenStax name, OpenStax logo, OpenStax book covers, OpenStax CNX name, and OpenStax CNX logo, and Rice University name, and Rice University logo trademarks, or wordmarks are not subject to the Creative Commons license and may not be reproduced without the prior and express written consent of Rice University.