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Etrips posted:Found out this morning I am officially a licensed RN! Now the hard part to find a job. Congrats! What type of floor are you going to apply to?
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Sep 11, 2014 01:05
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Hughmoris posted:Congrats! What type of floor are you going to apply to? To be honest, the area I'm living in is saturated. So I'll be happy with anything.
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Sep 11, 2014 01:34
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Etrips posted:To be honest, the area I'm living in is saturated. So I'll be happy with anything. Congrats and good luck with the job search! Keep an open mind, use a direct hospital/facility website to look for jobs, and don't stress out if it takes a while.
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Sep 11, 2014 02:08
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I'm going to be taking a quarter long CNA class in Washington state. Could anyone give me some advice/information for what I'm getting myself into from their own experiences? Feels like little of the chat here has involved CNAs specifically.
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Sep 12, 2014 01:48
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ReibuOrumai posted:I'm going to be taking a quarter long CNA class in Washington state. Could anyone give me some advice/information for what I'm getting myself into from their own experiences? Feels like little of the chat here has involved CNAs specifically. Moving patients, body mechanics, taking vitals, bed baths, changing beds, bed pans. I am sure there is more than that. Maybe EKGs. Just learn how to be nice to people and network and you should be fine. A good CNA is like gold.
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Sep 12, 2014 20:49
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Talking aloud to myself during skill checks helped me. 'I'm washing my hands...'
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Sep 12, 2014 21:02
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ReibuOrumai posted:I'm going to be taking a quarter long CNA class in Washington state. Could anyone give me some advice/information for what I'm getting myself into from their own experiences? Feels like little of the chat here has involved CNAs specifically. The class is skills and practice - handwashing, vitals, changing a bed with a person in it, bedpans, pericare, shaving faces, putting on compression socks. Easy things made hard. Getting used to walking into someones room to wipe their butt. The transition from class to job is rough. Either you got it or you don't and probably half the CNAs you will work with don't (in lobgterm care anyways). Great experience ibefore nursing school. I really liked the people I took care of, but felt very overworked and underpaid. So.... lots of job openings!
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Sep 13, 2014 05:10
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ReibuOrumai posted:I'm going to be taking a quarter long CNA class in Washington state. Could anyone give me some advice/information for what I'm getting myself into from their own experiences? Feels like little of the chat here has involved CNAs specifically. CNA class itself isn't difficult, but it's important to pay close attention to detail. What you do for patients and what you observe and record can influence a patient's plan of care. For example if you measure blood pressure wrong a patient may or may not get a medication that would change their treatment. Seems obvious but don't be one of those people that measures things "close enough." Supplemental things like assisting with med passing or doing EKGs are probably not included in your class and would be taught to you at your employer's discretion. As for being a CNA, it's a lot of dirty work. Lots of touching body fluids, lifting for mobility or transfers, helping out with activities of daily living like getting dressed, bathed, etc. Definitely lets you know pretty quickly if you want to be a part of the medical field for the rest of your life. I enjoyed being a CNA. I worked at two different group and nursing home facilities that had several different homes that I would float around to, from homes from the elderly to the mentally disabled to people with severe mental illness. It was a really good experience, you learn a lot about interacting with other people and being comfortable introducing yourself to a total stranger and then wiping their butt. The more comfortable you get, the more comfortable patients will be around you, and that's huge if you plan on going into nursing. It's a good life skill, too (being an amiable person, not wiping strangers' butts, though you never know).
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Sep 13, 2014 15:23
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Where are all the primary health care nurses?  I won't be registered for another 3 months but I'm curious as to peoples experience working in PHC. I already have a job offer (extremely lucky!) for a GP clinic I ADORE but I also feel like I don't deserve this and I'm going to be totally incompetent and a loser and maim a bunch of children. Is this normal new grad worries or am I just actually stupid?
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Sep 14, 2014 08:45
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Peach posted:Where are all the primary health care nurses? Congratulations on the job offer, the person who interviewed you must have seen something they liked to have hired you that far in advance! Be easy, fellow new-nurse. Probably you are going to make mistakes at first, but hopefully your fear will keep you alert and vigilant. Remember the important stuff like standard precautions and communication and how to give shots to kiddos and you'll probably be great. And remember: If you don't know, ask.
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Sep 14, 2014 18:14
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Madame Psychosis posted:Congratulations on the job offer, the person who interviewed you must have seen something they liked to have hired you that far in advance! No interview @_@ I was there for clinical a in my fifth semester and they loved me and offered me a position. I couldn't have been luckier, jobs are incredibly hard to get as a new grad here. Which compounds on the "I don't deserve this" shame spiral! I'm a solidly average student. There are tonnes of my classmates that deserve this opportunity more!
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Sep 14, 2014 21:15
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Peach posted:I'm a solidly average student. There are tonnes of my classmates that deserve this opportunity more! Your classmates are eggheads, be happy for yourself!
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Sep 14, 2014 21:52
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fanpantstic posted:The class is skills and practice - handwashing, vitals, changing a bed with a person in it, bedpans, pericare, shaving faces, putting on compression socks. Easy things made hard. Getting used to walking into someones room to wipe their butt. The transition from class to job is rough. Either you got it or you don't and probably half the CNAs you will work with don't (in lobgterm care anyways). Great experience ibefore nursing school. I really liked the people I took care of, but felt very overworked and underpaid. So.... lots of job openings! When I enrolled in nursing school, I knew I wouldn't even be able to be an SNT before my UIC from being laid off would still be around, so I got my CNA license. Was definitely one of the best things I could've done after going to nursing school. Even though I'm only in 101 now, and I've only been an CNA since the beginning of the year, I have such an incredible leg up on pretty much the rest of my classmates, its amazing. It gave me a good appreciate of how things worked in a healthcare setting, what was expected of job roles, and of course who to do basic care both as a CNA and RN. Also, as opposed to how the pre-req's work (like A&P and such) where its a lot of memorization, nursing classes are a lot more about critical thinking, which is much more up my ally, and while I moved along through the prereqs with average-ish grades, apparently I'm doing quite well compared to the rest of my classmates gradewise now, and while I'm no dummy, I attribute alot of that to having any sort of clinical experience.
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Sep 15, 2014 05:21
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Peach posted:No interview @_@ I was there for clinical a in my fifth semester and they loved me and offered me a position. I couldn't have been luckier, jobs are incredibly hard to get as a new grad here. Which compounds on the "I don't deserve this" shame spiral! I'm a solidly average student. There are tonnes of my classmates that deserve this opportunity more! Unless you are planning on going to graduate school, your grades mean very little to potential employers (in my experience talking to hiring managers). Our unofficial school motto was C=RN. You just have to pass the NCLEX. They see something in you and like how you handle patients. Run with it. And good luck.
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Sep 15, 2014 05:49
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This has probably been asked before but I'm too lazy to try to find it in this thread. Any recommendations on good CCRN study books?
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Sep 19, 2014 20:29
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I didn't really study much(you won't need to if you work in a CVICU.) But I dug "Pass CCRN" it's a really good ICU reference book in its own right.
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Sep 20, 2014 00:40
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 Finished the NCLEX in 75.
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Sep 20, 2014 18:21
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I'm sorry.
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Sep 20, 2014 18:24
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Well, after a year and a half or so working on an orthopedic unit after graduating, some things have sort of come into perspective. Maybe this will be nice to some of you still in school. I no longer "fear" (worry) inserting Foley's into females. Turns out once you do a dozen you're (pretty much) fine! Blood draws are something they should teach in school because I find it fun every time! That person a few pages back posting about calculating grains in dosage totally mystifies me. Never even heard of that! My unit is great for helping each other, so stress is never too nuts! If I'm ever concerned about a procedure - I can just look it up through hospital resources! As a HUMAN MALE I am asked to help with patient transfers all the time! And so are the other nurses! I wish I could have a c. diff patient that wasn't confused or immobile! The kids you hate in nursing school you don't have to pretend to like in the real world! Moral of the story: Nursing school can be pretty frustrating/difficult/soul-draining/etc, but just target your weaknesses and always improve, you'll get through! Also this is the first I've seen of those medication vests and they are pretty rad. Leave me alone - I need to total a fluid balance sheet! As a Canadian RN, I'm hoping to take my NCLEX this fall through the Michigan board. I've sent off my application info, so now it's just wait and see if I did it correctly. DeadMansSuspenders fucked around with this message at 21:22 on Sep 21, 2014 |
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Sep 21, 2014 19:43
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You worked for a year and a half without taking your NCLEX? Also, at what point do you actually feel competent? I'm graduating in May, and I definitely don't feel prepared to have peoples' lives in my hands. I mean, by this point in my program, we've learned all the big skills we're going to need. The rest is just tons of clinical hours. So here I am thinking "oh god I'm going to walk into the hospital my first day of work and just draw a blank".
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Sep 21, 2014 20:07
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Oh, haha, my mistake. I live and work in Canada, and am licensed through the CNO, I'll edit that in now to avoid more confusion. I'm just going for the NCLEX for more options in the future. I wasn't too worried about being comfortable competency-wise going into my job. That's because I was hired on the same unit as I did my final consolidation, so I had already been on the unit full-time (~430 hours). After hire, my hospital unit has a 12 shift mentoring/buddy program to make sure you know your stuff and have someone to help and answer questions as you may have them. As for drawing a blank, I think you'll surprise yourself. I know that I did. You find yourself in a situation, and just think "hey, I learned this". It may not go as smoothly or as textbook as you learned, but you've got more knowledge and skill than you realize at this point. It still took a few months to feel fully confident with most of the clients that I care for. There's still the occasional moment that I'll flounder, seemingly lost. I usually can just take a moment (if appropriate), think it through and talk through my plan with someone else to verify. I knew I was on the right track when I had people asking me to hear out their plan if they were in a sticky situation. DeadMansSuspenders fucked around with this message at 21:29 on Sep 21, 2014 |
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Sep 21, 2014 21:21
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Throughout school and five years of ICU I never had to foley a female. Dodged that bullet.
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Sep 21, 2014 21:30
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Bum the Sad posted:Throughout school and five years of ICU I never had to foley a female. Dodged that bullet. How the gently caress is that possible. Like I don't doubt you, but holy poo poo, thats amazing.
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Sep 21, 2014 23:21
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~*~Gangsta Skillz~*~ Fake edit: I worked CV/Surgical ICU so everybody came in with a foley. On the rare occasion I had to admit some medical overflow bullshit I just pulled a favor from one of the girls.
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Sep 22, 2014 00:39
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So, last week I had interviewed for a med surg position at a hospital. Did not hear back from them until today, saying that they had filled all their positions but wanted to know if I could interview with a few other departments. Had my telephone/webcam interview a few hours ago and they said that they wanted me to shadow the ED and Neuro ICU for a few hours tomorrow. I have read a lot already about the ED and know what to expect. But what about the Neuro ICU? What can I expect to see there? What can I do to impress the nurses / manager there?
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Sep 22, 2014 21:14
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Etrips posted:So, last week I had interviewed for a med surg position at a hospital. Did not hear back from them until today, saying that they had filled all their positions but wanted to know if I could interview with a few other departments. Had my telephone/webcam interview a few hours ago and they said that they wanted me to shadow the ED and Neuro ICU for a few hours tomorrow. Be interested and try to seem bright and halfway competent. No one will expect a non-ICU nurse to know what the hell is going on. Ask about training, ask about orientation periods... All about the patient population and what they deal with the most. Make it clear that you want to do it but that you want to do it well and want to know how they train people for such a specialized field. Then go home and think about if you really want to do neuro ICU because yikes that would probably be even more depressing than MICU.
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Sep 22, 2014 21:44
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Ohthehugemanatee posted:Be interested and try to seem bright and halfway competent. No one will expect a non-ICU nurse to know what the hell is going on. Ask about training, ask about orientation periods... All about the patient population and what they deal with the most. Make it clear that you want to do it but that you want to do it well and want to know how they train people for such a specialized field. I agree with all of this except asking about pt population. If you're going to apply for a neuro ICU job you really need to know what you're getting into since it's so specialized. It's a lot of the depressing stuff, things that people don't (or rarely) fully recover from. Strokes, motorcycle/car accidents, paralysis, violence, suicide attempts, etc. Lots of family stuff because a lot of times these things happen suddenly and without warning and these people will never be the same (or they will die, sometimes families are realistic but often times they are not and you end up giving a trach and PEG to a patient who never wanted that because their spouse wasn't ready to say goodbye, seems to happen more with neuro pts in my general experience). Are you familiar enough with neuro to know whether or not you like it? Working ICU is an awesome job but I could never work in a neuro-specific Unit. Not enough variety and too depressing. Also, as someone who worked med/surg before moving to a general ICU, going straight from school to a specialized critical care unit could be pretty overwhelming. Some hospitals will not consider new grads for ICU because you're more likely to fail if you have no prior experience. That might not happen to you but it's something to consider. ED would be a good place to start. You get a good general orientation, it's a really good place to gain a ton of experience, and you could move anywhere you want with ED on your resume. You'll get a feel for the place when you shadow, and that's cool that they're having you do that. Soak up as much info as you can and don't feel like you need to showcase your knowledge or anything, everyone will know you're a new grad. The most important thing is to ask questions and appear as if you're interested. If you don't know what something is, ask, if there's a procedure going on, see if you can watch, ask if there's anything cool you can see like ventrics, art lines, intubated/sedated people, paralytics and Train of Four, etc. Jump in and watch nurses do a full neuro assessment and see if there's anyone doing an NIH stroke scale assessment. Know how to assess someone for their Glasgow Coma Scale number. Good luck, tell us what you think.
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Sep 23, 2014 02:52
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Going straight to ICU of any type is fine, you won't learn habits that are counterproductive to the setting. If you have your head on straight and aren't a dummy you will thrive. If you struggle with prioritization, patio and autonomy then go elsewhere for a while. ICU will always be there if you want it.
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Sep 23, 2014 05:57
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It's better to go to ICU first and not waste time elsewhere. Skills you learn elsewhere are not gong to be applicable and all your fancy book learning is going to leak out your brain. Better to figure out it is or isn't for you in the beginning.
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Sep 23, 2014 17:00
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I wanted to post a follow-up from when I put out this distress call back in January:boquiabierta posted:So I just started an accelerated one-year BSN program, and need some talking down off the ledge. I'm still with it and doing SO much better. Thank you so much to all of you who posted words of encouragement and support. The program has been an insane ride, but I'm getting through it, and am on track to graduate in December. Just 2.5 months away! I still definitely have that in-over-my-head feeling, but I've learned that everyone feels that way, and I can't expect to graduate nursing school feeling "ready" and competent as a nurse; that feeling will hopefully just come gradually on the job. I spoke to a nurse who graduated from my program a few years ago, and she said that after six months of working you'll start to feel like maybe you're not going to kill someone today, and after a year you'll feel like a nurse. Honestly, that was one of the most encouraging things I've heard all year! Now I just have to worry about passing my last few classes and then the NCLEX! Thanks again to everyone, this is a great thread. 
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Sep 23, 2014 18:45
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Hello! Are there many nurses, based in the UK, in the thread?
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Sep 23, 2014 22:54
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Bum the Sad posted:It's better to go to ICU first and not waste time elsewhere. Skills you learn elsewhere are not gong to be applicable and all your fancy book learning is going to leak out your brain. Better to figure out it is or isn't for you in the beginning. It honestly depends on who you ask whether they believe going straight from grad to ICU is a good thing or not. I am glad I did general float pool first because I learned really basic new-employee stuff like how to use the charting system, putting doctor's names/faces and practice together, how to use the hospital's equipment, how to order stuff from supply, getting familiar with order sets, how to navigate the hospital, how to use the page system, how to fax stuff, etc. All of it is stuff you need to learn no matter where you work and is applicable everywhere, and none of which comes from fancy book learning or what you learned in nursing school. Personally, I am glad I was totally comfortable with being a hospital employee and knowing the systems and the doctors before I went to ICU and learned all the ICU specific equipment and routines and charting. It was way easier to be able to focus on stuff like "this is how a vent works" and not be stressing out about learning a brand new charting system and who to call for what problem, the basic stuff.
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Sep 24, 2014 03:31
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So long story short. Had an interview with a med-surg floor and was declined the position. Few days later had another interview with the same hospital with their emergency department and neuro ICU, along with a follow up interview from their OR department if I was interested in that as well. Then today, after shadowing the ED and neuro ICU, was literally offered any job of the three. I start my neuro ICU orientation in less than two weeks.
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Sep 24, 2014 04:32
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Etrips posted:I start my neuro ICU orientation in less than two weeks.
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Sep 24, 2014 05:10
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Ravenfood posted:Congratulations! Thanks! So I do have to ask, what is with the animosity between ICU and ED?
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Sep 24, 2014 16:41
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ED likes to dump patients in the ICU with poo poo undone and the ICU will call them on it. Example they'll have an order for a CT for hours, have a drat CT scanner in the ER and bring them up without doing the CT so we have to bring them right back down. Basically we just get pissed at them for ignoring orders that have been sitting in the chart for hours. Or they'll send a hypotensive patient up with 1 22 gauge in the wrist and of course by the time they get to us their BP is in the 60's when it was in the 80's downstairs so you can't find a vein start another. poo poo like that. Bum the Sad fucked around with this message at 17:32 on Sep 24, 2014 |
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Sep 24, 2014 17:28
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ICU and ED have sort of opposite nursing personalities. EDs have to be generalists, get-stuff-done-quick, high-stress, prioritize lots and lots of patients from each other. ICU nurses are more perfectionists who know a LOT about very specialized areas and have very tight control over their patients. At least that's the stereotype I've heard.
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Sep 24, 2014 18:02
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By ICU standards, the report we get from the ED is threadbare at best, the patient often is unstable as all hell with completely inadequate IV access, documentation is barely done on anything, stuff like the CT scan hasn't been done, and the patient probably has had a bowel movement. Of course, by the ED's standards, we actually got a drat report, the patient is more stable than they were on admission, we've got better access than what EMS gave (if EMS did anything), who honestly cares about the completely ridiculous amount of paperwork the ICU has to do sometimes, and cleaning up a BM takes a pretty low priority over dealing with the acute whatever in the next bay. I had a coworker bitch out an ED nurse for sending a patient up with an IO instead of a central line. That same coworker then freaked out a few days later when she got a patient with a dirty fem line (placed emergently). ED can't win. Not getting the CT scan does really irritate me though, because as mentioned, they have a scanner in their unit. I'm not a fan of how nasty my coworkers can be towards ED sometimes. edit: vvvvv that too. Ravenfood fucked around with this message at 19:49 on Sep 24, 2014 |
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Sep 24, 2014 18:38
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Our ICU docs are really great about intubating and throwing lines into their ED consults before having them transferred to us. It helps a lot. I try to look past the terrible handover and bed full of poo poo because our ED is a constant three-ring circus of violent psych patients and drug ODs and I wouldn't work there for any amount of money.
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Sep 24, 2014 19:34
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Atma McCuddles posted:ICU and ED have sort of opposite nursing personalities. EDs have to be generalists, get-stuff-done-quick, high-stress, prioritize lots and lots of patients from each other. ICU nurses are more perfectionists who know a LOT about very specialized areas and have very tight control over their patients. At least that's the stereotype I've heard. This perfectly explains why I don't like floating to the ED. I also hate floating to Med-surg because I get behind when I'm trying to do 30 minute head to toe assessments on all 5-6 patients. I don't get a choice anymore about floating to the ED. When both of my CCU beds are empty I have to help ED. At least flow between departments has gotten better.
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Sep 24, 2014 21:43
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