[ashfost]

Hello everyone! I am a pre-nursing student from Atl, GA. I plan to get my BSN then go to grad school to study anesthesia. Lately I have been debating whether I want to be a Nurse Anesthestist or an Anesthesiologist. Does anyone know what a CRNA can do to become an anesthesiologist? Do they have to do attend medical school for the full four year term or is there an "accelerated program"? (if that makes any sense) Thanks, Im just curious!

Ashfost

[TraumaNurse]

No such thing as an accelerated anesthesiology program for anesthetists. If you want to be an ologist, go to medical school, if you want to be a CRNA go to nursing school. Since you are just starting out, you need to decide whether you want to be a doctor or a nurse and then work towards that goal. Good luck with whatever route you decide.

[catcolalex]

whatever you decide to do, make your decision now, it will be better than doing CRNA school and then going back and starting med school later

[SMK1]

if you go crna then decide you want to be and MDA (anesthesiologist) you will have put in something like7-9 for crna (including 1 or 2 yrs experience in icu, assuming you can get straight into the ICU after graduation and thats a big if in a lot of places) and 4 yrs of med school and another 3-4 yrs residency i believe. so total amount of time would be anywhere from 14-17 yrs! figure out if you want to be a nurse or a doctor because doing it later will take a lot of time and cost you a lot more money both in school expenses and lost wages.

[ashfost]

thanks for respondin everyone! yeah, ure right, i do need to decide. the only thing that is making it hard is the salary. both have great pay but anesthesiologist is alot more. hmm.....decisions decisions. again thanks for responding! btw, this forum is awesome. im so happy i found it!

ashfost

[skipaway]

Originally Posted by ashfost

thanks for respondin everyone! yeah, ure right, i do need to decide. the only thing that is making it hard is the salary. both have great pay but anesthesiologist is alot more. hmm.....decisions decisions. again thanks for responding! btw, this forum is awesome. im so happy i found it!

ashfost

Is that all you're concerned about? You are a pre-nursing student, have you had any clinical yet? Do you even like taking care of people?

[ashfost]

Umm, excuse me, i didn't mean to sound superficial. if i didn't like caring for others than i wouldn't want to be a nurse in the first place. i just said that the only difference betweent the two professions is the amount of responsibility and salary. i never said anything about money being the only thing that mattered. i just made that one statement. if i offended u, i apologize. i apologize to the board if anyone else was offended by my comment. thanks.

ashfost

[Quincke]

If you are interested in anesthesia I suggest you follow a CRNA or an MDA around for a couple of days and decided what you would like to do. You may find that you don't even like the field. If you decided you do like it, the fastest you would be able to get through CRNA school would be about 8 years (four years college, 1 year working, 2+ years school). The fastest for the MDA route is probably 12 years (4 college, 4 med, probably 4 residency). All of this is assuming that you get accepted to either med or NA school ASAP, which does not happen for many people. One of the main reasons I chose the CRNA route was because of the time issue, but you have to figure out what is best for you