Hello!
I am a 3rd year nursing student (3 of 5 semesters) and I come from a corporate background. I have no previous nursing experience except of what I've learned in clinicals until NOW.
I have taken a job as a Nurse Intern II (basically a PCT) on a very busy Med-Tele floor at a small hospital (only 64 beds). I've just completed my first 12 hour shift (more like 13 hours) and let me tell you, it's NOTHING like what we've learned in nursing school or even done in clinicals.
I was responsible for 12 patients, getting VS q 4 hrs, blood sugars by 16:00, charting my OWN VS and blood glucose readings, removing foley's and IV's, doing bed changes and bed baths, recording intake and outputs on 6 of my patients, also watching for my dementia patient that has a bed alarm that PT forgot to reset and as a result, he fell out of bed. All of this in a 13 hr shift and I've learned more this day than I've EVER learned in nursing school up to this point. It's very real and when we were in clinicals, we were only there for 7 hours and it was mostly following a nurse around and sitting at the nurses station, that's about it. There were days that the floor was kinda busy, but there still wasnt any hands-on experience.
Nursing school is just the BASICS, kinda like boot camp. If you want real world experience, I suggest every nursing student takes a PRN position as a PCT or tech, or CNA, or Nurse Intern, whatever, just to get a feel of what the real world of nursing is like. Also, get in a groove to get your time management skills down, because you are going to need them in the real world. Although it was my first day on the floor, I tried to get my VS Q 4 hrs atleast one hour ahead of schedule so I can get them charted for the nurses to see when they passed meds.
And for the record, I only got a 30 minute lunch break and one 10 minute break towards the END of my shift prior to giving report.
But, I can say I LOVE IT! I love giving patient care and the teamwork between the nurses and the PCT's. Everyone works together to care for the patient and it's great!
But just be prepared, that nursing school does not even TAP on the real world of nursing. If you want experience where you can relate it back to school (careplans, tests, paperwork, etc), take a job as a tech, you will be glad you did.