Semester 3
Tiny humans, enormous consequences, zero margin for error.
Peds is not 'small adult med-surg.' Kids compensate beautifully and then crash without warning. This semester is about developmental milestones, weight-based everything, and recognizing the quiet kid who is actually in trouble.
Trying to memorize month by month is a losing game. Anchor points work.
Memory trick
2 mo: social smile. 4 mo: rolls front to back. 6 mo: sits with support, first solids, stranger anxiety starts. 9 mo: crawls, pincer grasp emerging. 12 mo: walks, 1–3 words, triples birth weight. 2 yr: 2-word phrases, runs, half of adult height. 3 yr: tricycle, 3-word sentences.
Age = number of words. Two years, two words. Three years, three words. You're welcome.
The difference between 'watch closely' and 'call the code.'
Memory trick
Distress: retractions, nasal flaring, grunting, tachypnea, tripod position. Failure: bradycardia, decreased effort, silent chest, altered LOC, cyanosis. Grunting in an infant is an emergency sign — it's their own PEEP.
A tired baby who stops working to breathe is not improving. Get help.
Most common peds admission and most common exam topic.
Memory trick
Best indicators: weight loss, urine output (infant <1 mL/kg/hr is low), capillary refill, sunken fontanel, absence of tears, mucous membranes. Weight is the gold standard — 1 kg lost = 1 L lost.
They will ask which vaccine is due at which visit.
Memory trick
Birth: Hep B. 2/4/6 mo: DTaP, IPV, Hib, PCV, rotavirus. 12–15 mo: MMR, varicella, Hep A. Live vaccines (MMR, varicella) are avoided in immunocompromised kids and pregnancy.
Peds exams are built around signature findings.
Memory trick
Barking seal cough + stridor = croup (humidity, racemic epi, steroids). Drooling + tripod + no cough = epiglottitis (do NOT inspect the throat, prep for airway). Currant jelly stool + sausage mass = intussusception. Olive mass + projectile vomiting in a 4-week-old = pyloric stenosis. Strawberry tongue + high fever ≥5 days = Kawasaki (IVIG, aspirin — the one time kids get aspirin).
Drooling child who won't lie down? Hands off that throat. Nothing in the mouth.
Free points once, lost points forever if you skip the practice.
Memory trick
Convert pounds to kg (÷2.2), multiply by the low and high mg/kg/day, divide by the number of doses, compare with what's ordered. If the ordered dose falls outside the range, you hold and clarify.
'It's close enough' is not a nursing intervention in peds.
Assessment tools are testable and age-specific.
Memory trick
FLACC: infants/nonverbal. FACES (Wong-Baker): 3+ years. Numeric 0–10: about 7–8+ years. Toddlers fear separation; preschoolers fear body harm and think illness is punishment; school-age want control; teens fear loss of independence and peer identity.
Anticipatory guidance is a guaranteed teaching question.
Memory trick
Rear-facing until at least age 2 (or max height/weight of the seat), back seat until age 13. Infants sleep alone, on their back, in a bare crib. No honey before 12 months (botulism). No whole cow's milk before 12 months.
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Nursing Fundamentals
Semester 1
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Pharmacology
Semester 2
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Med-Surg I
Semester 2
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Med-Surg II
Semester 3
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OB / Labor & Delivery
Semester 4
