Best province...

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What is the ebst province from nurse's point of view? I mean working conditions, wages and etc.

Specializes in Telemetry and Critical Care.

They will accomodate my expenses goin there for the 1st $5000. My family does speak good english. I may leave for Alberta (if I do decide to give it a crack) February next yr. My family can follow after three months when i'm good and settled. How much should a place for 2 adults and two kids cost? Decent 1 bedroom flat would do momentarily. Thanks for the reply bro...

Specializes in ER.

At least $1000 a month, you need to have 2 months rent ready (first and last month's).

You can see the $5000 will go quickly.

http://www.places4rent.com/finder.asp?LOCID=82

Specializes in Labor and Delivery & ICU.

I've worked in a couple of provinces. I started off in PEI and now I'm in Alberta. They both have positives and negatives though.

I found PEI to be great for working conditions and stress level. The workload was high, but I wasn't constantly being hounded to work on my days off, and I always got my breaks. Plus it's just a very friendly place in general. The pay definitely isn't great, but living expenses aren't too bad either. The nursing shortage isn't as obvious there, which is good, but it's also not easy to get a permanent full time position on a unit you want to work on, and community nursing is unofficially designated for nurses who have "done their time" in hospitals. Still a great place to live and work though.

Alberta is fantastic in some ways. The pay is great. And even though it can be really annoying to be called to come in every day, I don't feel all that bad saying "no", and I love the option of picking up overtime since you get double pay for it. Calgary is a very expensive city to live in, but I'm still coming out further ahead financially than I was on PEI. Plus I got to pick my unit and FTE, and Alberta payed my moving expenses. The big drawback is that since the population just keeps growing, the nursing shortage is PAINFUL. I often don't get breaks, and sometimes I feel like we're working in unsafe conditions. From what I've read here though, most provinces are feeling the same crunch.

Probably the best thing to do is decide where you want to live, then look into what nursing in that province is like. I'm guessing that no matter where you go, some people will love it, and some people will hate it.

Best of luck!

Specializes in NICU, PICU, PCVICU and peds oncology.

alianeco, if you're only feeling like you're working in unsafe conditions SOMETIMES, then you're ahead of me! I'm at that big world-renowned hospital up the highway from you... the self-proclaimed centre of excellence... For the last six months, we've been either hot-bunking like they do in the oilpatch, or we're double-bunking. The only time we ever have enough staff is on the Sunday night and Monday of a long weekend when all the casuals come out of the woodwork. I don't remember the last time we were at

Don't start me on casuals. I don't care how short staffed Capital Hell is, the casuals accept employement under the conditions that they work x number of weekends in a cycle. Staffing should damn well start telling them to pull their weight. I dread working Saturday and Sunday. It's freaking evil. Five to six surgical patients in the Surgical areas, Five mums and babes over in post partum, with it creeping up because of the way they admit and discharge over there. I've heard of nurses going through 8 mums and babes in one shift.

Specializes in NICU, PICU, PCVICU and peds oncology.

I hear ya!! We have a couple of casuals that we can count on to work EVERY stat holiday without fail. Doesn't matter if there's already "enough" people on the day shift, we get these two princesses anyway. Meanwhile, Friday night through to Sunday night, we might be short 5 or more... Our management has a policy of not cancelling casuals, but they'll surely cancel OT in a heartbeat, whether the unit's safe or not. Some shifts these days we have nurses who go through 4 ICU patients in a single shift. It's insane.

Specializes in Labor and Delivery & ICU.

Janfrn,

I think I work at the same Hospital as you! "Center of Excellence". Perhaps I was trying to word things carefully before. I know what you mean about being short staffed... I think we may have had 2 full staffed shifts since I started :(

Specializes in NICU, PICU, PCVICU and peds oncology.

alianeco, are you north or south? If you read fiona59's posts you can figure out where we are. I keep saying that if we're going to tell the world that we're a state-of-the-art, world class centre of excellence, we need to start looking like one!

oooh, I was trying to be discrete....:rolleyes:

the pay for nps in bc came from bc job ads which quoted the salary range.

anyone actually working as a np in bc who can validate the pay scale?

Specializes in Labor and Delivery & ICU.

Fiona59, I think you're being discrete enough... I'm not entirely convinced we're at the same hospital. But I suppose it's probably the same all over Calgary.

Specializes in NICU, PICU, PCVICU and peds oncology.

Fiona, looks like (y)our secret is safe!!

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