Advice needed for OR clinical: Large teaching or small community hospital?

[ruralgirl08]

I am training for the OR in Canada, our program is similar to Periop 101, but we have to request a clinical placement at the end. I work at a large teaching center 50 mins away from where I live, we do a lot of state of the art surgeries in our area here. There is a closer community hospital 30mins also from where I live, they do mostly general sx and ortho surgeries there.

The thing is I was denied a clinical placement where I work, but approved at the small community hospital. (I did contact my work and they are looking into it.) Because this is considered an educational experience, I am not guaranteed any job at the end, but potentially I may get a job offer.

The Dilemma: Eventually I would like to work at the community hospital, but am worried I could be missing out on the great training/experiences available at the teaching hospital, (plus I already work at the teaching hospital.) If you were in my situation, and potentially offered both placements, which would you choose? I plan to work in the OR for the rest of my career, I still got 27yrs to go!:)

[daVinciNurse]

I spent my first 10 years or so in a community hospital then transferred to a teaching/trauma facility.....it took a little getting used to (I got about 14 wks of orientation) , but really once you know the basics of OR nursing, you can do almost anything anywhere.

[ruralgirl08]

That is encouraging. At this point I will be going where they will take me, thank you for the reply!

[ruralgirl08]

So it looks like I might have the option of doing either. What would you recommend to train in teaching or community?

[LAM2010, BSN]

I will just say I recommend the community hospital. If my guess is right, the people will be friendlier, and you will have more range. One person in a small OR will do all kinds of cases, whereas one person in a large teaching hospital is more specified in an individual position. You will get a broad scope with the same person in the small OR, but you might get put with a person in the big OR who only does one surgery. EITHER way, you will get the basic OR experience - sterility, turn-around time, safety, etc.