Acute Care NP Career Options

[Hiking RN]

I have been a nurse for 10 years in adult cardiology (Ranging from CVICU, cath lab and EP lab). I want to got back to school and was leaning towards acute care NP programs.

After asking around,my hospital hires FNP and ACNP for the same jobs basically. Some ACNPs have warned me it can be harder to find jobs since you cannot see all ages. Have other ACNPs noticed this?

I have always worked in a hospital, but may want to transition to an doctors office or clinic some day, just not now.

Is it safer to get a FNP degree, so that you can see "all ages" and have more job opportunities? I personally, would prefer working with adults, since all my experience has been with adults, mostly in critical care settings.

Have other ACNPs had difficulty finding jobs?

Thanks!!

[Corey Narry, MSN, RN, NP]

I've not run across a problem as an Adult ACNP since the jobs I pursued and have worked in prefer my ACNP specialty and only serve the adult population (I work in Critical Care). I have heard from some classmates who work in the ED that although they were hired in that setting, they are limited in their practice (can't see kids) and have a knowledge gap initially (compared to those FNP trained) in terms of identifying primary care issues (musculo-skeletal, rashes, etc). Some of my classmates combine in-patient and out-patient practice in Adult Cardiology so ACNP does not limit you to just hospital practice.

[diprifan]

Its the same at my hospital, they prefer ACNP over FNP/AGNP but hire either really. I have seen a lot of neurosurgery practices want FNP to see all the patients the neurosurgeon can see, but that is very anecdotal. Our ED is large enough that there is a separate peds ED so they hire ACNPs in the ED.