Advice on transitioning to RN

busylilnurse · Apr 8, 2015

Im not sure why your companies policies and procdures would help?? maybe Im missing something ...but I would suggest a good NCLEX review book, maybe Saunders.

SuperMomBob · Apr 12, 2015

I believe she was meaning for me to brush up on skills that I may not be using. During orientation she kept talking about how hard it was for LPN's to reset their thinking to that of an RN. I am starting with a group of students at the beginning of the 3rd semester. I am curious as to what topics they have covered and if I am going to be lost the first day...

SquishyRN, BSN, RN · Apr 12, 2015

Is there a transition course prior to starting your first day with the 3rd semester RN students? When I did my bridge program, the summer before the 3rd semester all the LVNs took a 6 week transition course that was basically LVN school boot camp. It was a crash course review on everything the other students had learned in their 1st year so that when we started in the fall with them we were all on the same page.

All of us LVNs were nervous that we were expected to know more because we were already LVNs. We all came from different backgrounds... some were new grads who hadn't even started working as LVNs yet, others only did clinic and home health and were afraid they had forgotten a lot of their skills. Once we started with the other students though, there was no distinction, we were all RN students just the same. That definitely took a lot of the worry off.

SuperMomBob · Apr 13, 2015

No transition course. It is the same school I got my LPN so at least all their rules and system are not foreign. I will also have some familiar instructors and some of the same clinical sites. I guess my best options would be to read over my text book!

CT Pixie, BSN, RN · Apr 15, 2015

I believe she was meaning for me to brush up on skills that I may not be using. During orientation she kept talking about how hard it was for LPN's to reset their thinking to that of an RN. I am starting with a group of students at the beginning of the 3rd semester. I am curious as to what topics they have covered and if I am going to be lost the first day...

I felt a lot like you do when I was beginning my LPN to RN.

Since you are starting in the 3rd of I assume a 4 semester program, its safe to say that the topics they covered in the first 2 semesters are what your State's BON believes you covered during your entire LPN schooling. So you will all be learning the same thing at that point.

I found that the nursing classes I had to take in the 3rd and 4th semesters (med/surg, psych, etc) were not so much new topics and information, than it was a refresher of what i learned during my LPN schooling. My LPN school was intense and we were assigned and tested on every single page of our texts! It was insane. Of course, while I found a lot of the topics gone over in my RN program to be a refresher of what I learned previouly, I did learn more. I think its due to different people teaching the same info in a different way. Some things that I sort of grasped during LPN school, I totally got once a new teacher explained it.

As for skills, while you might not be using them now, its like riding a bike, you will remember once you do it again. My LPN to RN program required a skills check off prior to beginning the program. Those skills were all the skills the other students had to learn and be checked off on. So any skills not listed on it were going to be new things we ALL would be taught :)

The hardest part about the whole process for me (especially being an older (44 yrs old) non-traditional student) was that the class all had a year or more if they did pre-reqs together, to bond and become friends or at least friendly with each other. I was new knew kid in class and that always sucks. But I was able to make friends and feel part of the group after not too long.

SuperMomBob · Apr 16, 2015

Thanks! It's a 5 semester program and we join in the last three. I know there is only 12 of us joining in with the other 85. I will know a few people..I work with some of them as CNA's. The instructors just sent us an email saying we had to buy a HESI practice test with 1600 questions...so I guess I will be practicing that!

NamasteN · Apr 16, 2015

I believe she was meaning for me to brush up on skills that I may not be using. During orientation she kept talking about how hard it was for LPN's to reset their thinking to that of an RN. I am starting with a group of students at the beginning of the 3rd semester. I am curious as to what topics they have covered and if I am going to be lost the first day...

That's exactly what I did. The first year of RN was mostly CNA stuff you learned in LPN school. Then we went straight into Cardio/Pulmonary. The things I needed to review were head to toe assessment, wound assessment, vitals, abnormals, lab values etc. everything else is going to be stuff you learned in LPN but at a much deeper level. You will hear the topic and think oh ok I know this then a paragraph in you're madly taking notes and as lost as the student next to you. It was not hard to "reset my thinking" not sure what your teacher meant by that but some of my profs were not fans of LPN's and were hard on us in lab. I know I had picked up some bad habits in the nursing home so you might want to review skills, like trach, and catheter insertion and sterile procedure. You'll be fine, have an open mind and get ready, it's hard!

SuperMomBob · Apr 17, 2015

Thanks! I believe what she was trying to say in not so many words was don't be cocky. I certainly will not be!