is nursing home a starter for grads or medsurg?

You're a new grad, get your knowledge and skills honed a little faster in an acute setting. Besides geriatrics ain't your first choice. Don't make it your first mistake.

Because of a slow turn over of patients in long-term care facilities, diseases and treatments tend to become common and routine. Besides you need to have special qualities, not necessarily skills to become a geriatric nurse .

'just my insight. I hope my response won't instigate a battle between LTC and acute care nurses. Albeit, I am both!

It's apples vs. oranges,doll....Med surg is the area to loose your virginity.You already know your stuff-you'll learn how to apply your knowledge,to prioritize and manage your time and hone your technical skills....Geriatrics is very rewarding if it's your "bag" but first you have to learn your "normals" so you can successfully assess a geriatric patients with their "normal abnormals"-hope you follow that.....I have seen many grads initially hesitant about going into med-surg and then they get comfortable in LTC and are afraid to ever experience other kinds of nursing.I think the best nurse is often the one with the varied background...In LTC you have to learn to delegate and manage-not the best place if you enjoy alot of patient contact.I hate the days that I am buried in paperwork or involved in conflicts between other staff -and there is always an ISSUE-argh!Good luck in whatever you do-Nursing is great.....

I would work on med/surg to fine tune your skills first. In a lot of nursing homes, you are the only nurse on and you have to feel comfortable with your assessment skills because there will be no one to ask a second opinion from. Believe me, I talk from experience! (my nursing home job out of school lasted 5 weeks). You get little or no orientation in most cases and have a lot of elderly people with chronic health problems that you are responsible for. Whatever you choose, good luck!!

Reading through these messages has to make me smile because I too once fell for the "acute is the only way to go for new nurses" routine..

A little bit about me so you know where Im coming from. Im a 48 year old nurse, currently an assistant director of nursing for a 566 bed Long Term Care facility in upstate New York. We care for all ages, from 6 months to 102. We have 2 respiratory floors, a pediatric floor, a specialized alzheimers unit, a wandering unit, an acute care rehab unit, and 8 Long Term Care units. My background is not long term care, but public health, ambulatory care with some ED/ICU thrown in for good measure.

Long term care (the perferred term) is much more than just "old people" any more. The acuity level in some long term care facilites comes very close to what you will find in any acute facility. We deal with neurological, cardiac, respiratory, GI, GU, Musculoskelatal and all in between. We are not the dumping ground for "nurses who cant make it." I won't hire burned out nurses becuase they want "an easier time."

Long term care is a career path in itself. I hire new grads, both RNs and LPNs and watch them grow into excellent nures.. Nurses whom I would be more than happy to take care of me or my family. We have nurses here who have worked in the facility for 30 years.

Are there bad LTC nurses... of course there are, just like there are bad acute care nurses. I am reminded of the nurse in a large acute care hospital here in town... this is susposed to be the "premier" care facility here... the end all of medical care. When one of my residents came back to me after a long course of anitbiotic therapy with a stage IV decub, I asked the floor nurse what happend. The response...."that's a long term care issue, we don't deal with that here." It makes me wonder what nursing school she went too.

Choose a career path that makes you happy. Geriatrics was not my first choice either, but I cannot imagine myself doing anything else but this. You should at least try long term care. You might be surprised how much you will learn, both as a nurse and as a person..

Although LTC is not the best place to learn all the skills of nursing it is a start. I started in a LTC facility. You will be in a supervisory role and learn from that aspect. One thing I would advise. DO not let CNAs or other nurses who have been in the field for a long time intimidate you. You obviously know your stuff, so listen to their opinions then do what you think in your nursing judgement is right.
Good Luck!!!!