AF ER Nursing

[Az_RN_BSN]

I am an experienced ER Nurse (and AF reserve nurse) looking into going on active duty. Are there any AF ER nurses that can tell me what your experiences have been specific to the ER? Differences in active duty versus civilian ER nursing? What type of schedule do you work? Are you allowed to moonlight at all? And lastly...what type of options did you have for assignments? Thanks!

[midinphx, BSN]

I'm an ICU AF nurse. There are many different "ER's" - won't compare to civilian - more like UC. The only level 1 trauma center is in San Antonio. We combine with army at San Antonio Mil Med Center. You can expect a rotating schedule between nights and days working 7 shifts every 2 weeks. Expect extra duties and meetings on your days off many times. ICU and ER tend to deploy a lot, though with a withdrawl from Afghanistan, who knows how that will go ...

[Az_RN_BSN]

By additional duties are you referring to running programs such as..... Infection Control, SABC...that sort of thing? Do you feel like there is a good work-life balance or do you feel like you are constantly working? Just curious :)

[midinphx, BSN]

At first, I felt like I was constantly working or at work or attending to something at work. But once I settled down a bit and got the new flow, I do feel more like I have time to myself. Extra duties are similar to infection control committee or something along that lines, just depends what the unit needs.

I'm not sure how it's going to go in the future, but deployments for ICU and ER have been pretty frequent. I don't know anyone who moonlights, nor anyone who wants to here. But it's a higher acuity hospital. I guess if the unit is more urgent care than ER, I'd want to moonlight to keep my skills up.

When you are a specialty nurse, assignment preference availabilities shrink. You'll have fewer places to choose from. I'm not sure where ER availability is though