How's the job market there in Indiana?

U.S.A. Indiana

Published

Specializes in Med surg, cardiac, case management.

I'm in Chicago and going to be graduating soon, and I've found out some of the area hospitals have hiring freezes.

I've also heard that these freezes may be ended by the summer, but in case they aren't I was thinking about looking for jobs in NW Indiana.

So, is it looking any better there?

Thanks

Things are still really good here... around INDY.

Specializes in Family Nurse Practitioner.

you would think that this was a Ivy Tech nurse blog instead of a Indiana nurse blog.

Well I think around Indy things are good. In Northern IN near the MI border things are ok, but far from great. Your best bet is to poke around now before you graduate, rather than waiting till you are done with no job to go to.. But that's just my :twocents:.

Specializes in LTC.

I'm in central IN and the job market is so-so. You can always find a job in LTC but I know one of the hospitals in my town just layed off approximately ninety nurses.

St. Anthony's is not hiring in Crown Point. Community Hospital is hiring in Munster new grads for their new oncology unit. St. Mary's in Hobart - never seems to be looking for new grads - people must be pretty happy and stay there. You may want to check at Methodist Hospital in Merrillville (but they have had financial challenges in the recent past). I do not know about St. Margarets in Hammond but St. Catherine's in East Chicago is always looking for nurses and sometimes pays bonuses. If you speak Spanish you'll really be in luck at St. Catherine's. I had a friend who worked ER there and really enjoyed the staff. Indy hospitals - that's quite a drive from NW Indiana but they are having some challenges also - a few lay offs - not nurses though. If you are interested in Advocate Christ in Oak Lawn or one of their other locations they do have a new grad program. You'll really have better luck at the bigger hospitals in Chicago and make about $4-$5 more per hour on average to start. Good luck!

I would say that the hiring is slow in Indy. I'm also noticing that there are NP jobs, case manager jobs, and such but not a lot for someone with fewer than 2 years of experience. For standard staff RN jobs, a lot of them specify 2+ years it seems. At the big hospitals in Indy they are basically working staff RNs like dogs and changing their RN to patient ratios so that fewer RNs serve more patients, which of course isn't good. PCAs are also overextended. If you want to snag a job fast, go to Florida or Texas - I have recruiters calling me from there after just glancing at my resume online not to mention all of the emails they send about free relocation. Of course if you don't want to move, it just may take more time because hospitals are doing everything they can right now to not hire a lot of people and to not give any raises. Even though there is a nursing shortage, not all hospitals are doing very well with their budgets - some units a lot worse than others. Honestly, the health care industry is in flux right now and thus so is the nursing industry. :cool:

I work at a big hospital in Indy (Methodist) and at least on our unit they are not changing nurse to patient ratios-on days we never have more than 4 pts (nights has 5). On days we always have PCAs, at least one, usually 3. Pay is competitve and we just got approved to get our raises this year. I love my job, yeah, some days we do work like dogs but its not bad for the most part. I love the unit I am on and the type of pts we have. I know we are hiring, but its not NW IN. But if you are looking for a great place to work come here! Or Clarian Arnett in Lafayette, but I don't think they are really hiring.

Tiffany :D

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