Mother Baby RN

[danceluver]

I am starting nursing school in the fall. I am very interested in working in the women's health side of nursing (or peds) and I think Mother/Baby might be the perfect avenue for me. What is your job like working in Mother Baby or postpartum? What is your daily schedule look like? What do you do during your shift? Do you find it exciting and stimulating to be helping new moms? Educating them and helping them learn how to take care of their new bundle of joy?

Is it hard getting into a mother/baby unit as a new grad (as opposed to LD or another related department)?

Thank you.

[mombabyRN96]

It is very exciting most of the time! It is a lot of teaching. We have a lot of teen moms, drug addicts, and sad social situations as well. We take care of mom and baby usually up to four couplets. I work nights so my favorite part is working the nursery and being able to have time to just cuddle and rock the babies ( although it doesn't happen too often!). Where I work, it is much more difficult to get a job in labor and delivery as a new grad. Good luck to you!

[ADPIE2008]

I'm an RN in Women's Health on a mostly postpartum floor where we do couplet care. We almost always have 8 pts. For example, 4 couplets or 3 couplets + 2 antepartums. Sometimes we get GYN pts too. I am usually so busy that I barely have time to do any teaching. I cover the basics with them, but that's usually it. If I were to try to spend more time with my pts, I would end up staying late to chart and get into big trouble for that!

I love the postpartum pts (especially the babies) and I hate it that I don't get to slow down and spend more time with them. Before signing up to work anywhere, make sure you know what the nurse to pt ratio is and is the hospital for-profit or nonprofit. My hospital is for-profit.

[winter_green]

When I was in nursing school in CA, after a few months into the program you can work as a nurse assistant (same thing as CNA only that you're not certified). I was able to work as a nurse assistant in our local hospital in the Mother Baby unit. That helped a lot and helped me when I was done with nursing school landing a job right into L&D.

Other students were also NA (nurse assistants) in other units and they said great things about working and gaining all the experience that got from working there. They were also priority when they graduated bc the nurse manager knew them and they were considered internal applicants.

That is my advice to you, get your foot into the door. If not, try nursing internships. This is one thing I also did while in nursing school, would be great if you are in CA because any nursing students in CA can apply, http://www.csuchico.edu/rcnp/

Apply early beacause as you can tell, it gets full fast.

[Britrn04, BSN, MSN, RN]

I have worked in a few different facilities from the West coast doing couplet care to the East coast where it's a mesh of everything to the South, where now I am just doing PP mother's with a separate nursery. It is usually very busy with 8 patients where trying to do teaching and provide good care is a challenge. I agree with a previous post...know nurse:patients ratios and how they compare to national standards. It is a fun job, but it depends on the facility and the set up/goals of the unit!!