Is it any fun working in a doctors office as an RN? Or something along those lines

wnb4 · Mar 8, 2011

No offense to nurses working in dr's offices, but I worked for 1 day at a dr's office and was bored out of my mind. I've worked in a nursing home 9 years and I've never stuck myself with a used needle.

Yeah, I'm not to worried about it anymore.. I mean that girl that got pricked was probably rushing or something. My grandma is an LPN and out of all her years of nursing she knew 1 nurse to get pricked with an HIV positive needle

allnurses Guide · Mar 8, 2011

. . .]there was one other nurse in the office. she was an older woman who was helping in the office with phone calls and administrative things the docs couldn’t get to. she would ask me almost everyday why i wasn’t in the hospital and refer to the office as somewhere old nurses go to wait until retirement. she was right. i had just worked too hard to get 3 college degrees and be a medical assistant in a lab coat.

that was just me. if you like the slow pace, it may be for you. you may get in a better office with better docs that don’t take advantage, but my advice is to really consider both sides of it. there is a small chance that with safe practice you will be stuck with a needle, there is a large chance that in a doctor's office you could lose skills and hurt your chance of returning to a hospital in the future.

i know you weren't saying that as a put-down to office nurses, but only as a way to offer a different view of life as a nurse in ambulatory/outpatient care with respect to the slow pace . . .i worked at a clinic as the only help whatsoever for an allergist and a dermatologist who who split the fulltime hours and shared exam rooms and their office (which involved a lot of really hilarious and childish gotcha behavior between the two but i digress).

i took all the phone calls, (hi! i got my shot an hour ago and my throat feels like it's closing up!) made all the appointments, scheduled and performed all the allergy testing (usually started scratch testing while trying to keep his schedule moving along), ordered all the serums (if you screw that up it could get real bad fast) helped w/more complex biopsies and all having to separate in my mind two completely different specialties and issues of same (many undiagnosed psych patients call dermatologists because they imagine a lot of things involving skin- bugs crawling,etc) a slow pace it was not, more like a fast moving game of racquetball. i really don't share that as a supernurse story. i think your colleague was a tad off the mark with the last stop before the pasture opinion. :nurse:

just for the record, i don't think a medical assistant could have done it. not to put down mas, but no. you can be challenged in an office/clinic. i had worked at the hospital first, though, and i'm really glad i did.

wnb4 · Mar 8, 2011

I like your reply!

BluegrassRN · Mar 8, 2011

I worked in a small doc office; I was office nurse to two practitioners at the same time (so I worked up both their patients), plus drew all the labs, did all the phone triage, stocked the rooms, ordered supplies, ran controls on all equipment, and sometimes had time for lunch.

I really enjoyed it. It was fast paced (faster than my current med/surg job *gasp*), and I had a lot of autonomy. I noticed, for example, a lot of patients asking what they could do to avoid the flu (many in our practice did not immunize for religious and cultural reasons). I mentioned it to one of the practitioners, and she said "Okay, write something up!" so I did. I wrote up an informational paper that we hung in all exam rooms and waiting rooms, detailing how to stay healthy. Many women had questions regarding natural family planning, and again, the practitioner asked me to develop an educational pamphlet. Basically, if anyone saw a need for something educational, or a new standard we should be following, or a new piece of equipment we should have, it was our responsibility to follow through. In larger offices, I'm sure it's not so; but in the smaller one, I really had a lot of freedom and responsibility.

I became friends with many of the patients, as you get to know them over the years. I thoroughly enjoyed my time in the physicians' office. I only left because the commute became too great of a burden, and I was going back to school and needed more flexibility in my schedule.

Working in a physician's office can be challenging, interesting, and fun. It could probably also bore your socks off. I'm the type of person who could be entertained in a box, though, so I may not be the best judge. I mean, I *love* med/surg nursing, so my judgement is definitely suspect.

Happy BSN · Mar 8, 2011

You might seek out a job in a specialty office, such as cardiology. Lots of RNs working in those! You can manage a clinic such as the Coumadin clinic or lipid clinic and be highly involved in patient education or you can supervise the LPN and MA staff. I worked as a research nurse in a large cardiology office and, while there was a lot of problems, I did enjoy having my own desk and setting my own schedule.

wnb4 · Mar 9, 2011

I worked in a small doc office; I was office nurse to two practitioners at the same time (so I worked up both their patients), plus drew all the labs, did all the phone triage, stocked the rooms, ordered supplies, ran controls on all equipment, and sometimes had time for lunch.
I really enjoyed it. It was fast paced (faster than my current med/surg job *gasp*), and I had a lot of autonomy. I noticed, for example, a lot of patients asking what they could do to avoid the flu (many in our practice did not immunize for religious and cultural reasons). I mentioned it to one of the practitioners, and she said "Okay, write something up!" so I did. I wrote up an informational paper that we hung in all exam rooms and waiting rooms, detailing how to stay healthy. Many women had questions regarding natural family planning, and again, the practitioner asked me to develop an educational pamphlet. Basically, if anyone saw a need for something educational, or a new standard we should be following, or a new piece of equipment we should have, it was our responsibility to follow through. In larger offices, I'm sure it's not so; but in the smaller one, I really had a lot of freedom and responsibility.
I became friends with many of the patients, as you get to know them over the years. I thoroughly enjoyed my time in the physicians' office. I only left because the commute became too great of a burden, and I was going back to school and needed more flexibility in my schedule.
Working in a physician's office can be challenging, interesting, and fun. It could probably also bore your socks off. I'm the type of person who could be entertained in a box, though, so I may not be the best judge. I mean, I *love* med/surg nursing, so my judgement is definitely suspect.

I like your answer! Thank you

linguine · Mar 10, 2011

The main challenge of working in a clinic or medical office is the traffic of patients every day. At my workplace, the nurses alone have to triage 20-40 patients a day (not including the ones through phone triage) because the supply of providers cannot meet the demand for that day.

The second challenge is that high traffic volume also means constant infection control. This practice must be done before/after every patient times however many rooms and public spaces there are in the clinic. In an OR or ICU, infection control is especially important but mainly confined to that room and that one patient. less traffic, less chances for spread of infection. In a clinic, every ill (and healthy) is a potential carrier of disease into the clinic as well as back out to the community when they are done with the appointment. I got sick pretty often during my first few months there but hopefully this means my immune system is stronger for it.

emptyboxcars · Dec 14, 2012

I worked at a community health center (more or less like a doctor's office) and LOVED it. I got stuck once by a needle there but people get stuck by needles in hospitals too. As a matter of fact, I got a stick while working in the nursery a few years ago.
What I loved about the CHC was that we did everything except prenatal care - babies, kids, adolescents, adults, geriatrics, you name it. I saw all kinds of cool diagnoses and learned a whole lot that I use now that I work in a hospital.

I know this is an old thread, but please tell me more about working in community health. This is an area I am very interested in as a new grad, but I have no idea how to crack into this field!

elprup, BSN, RN · Jan 10, 2013

I know this is an old thread, but please tell me more about working in community health. This is an area I am very interested in as a new grad, but I have no idea how to crack into this field!

Check for small rural health centers in your area. I usually google search for all medical centers in my area. Then go to each website. If they are federally funded they usually see everybody - my clinic did. I loved it, just disliked management and the drama, and I was working as an assistant...so there you go. Also check you county website for public health nurse positions if you have your PHN. sometimes in rural area they will take new grads.

emptyboxcars · Jan 10, 2013

Check for small rural health centers in your area. I usually google search for all medical centers in my area. Then go to each website. If they are federally funded they usually see everybody - my clinic did. I loved it, just disliked management and the drama, and I was working as an assistant...so there you go. Also check you county website for public health nurse positions if you have your PHN. sometimes in rural area they will take new grads.

Thanks for replying to me! I appreciate it.

JZ_RN · Jan 19, 2013

If you think an office is boring you work in too small of an office. I am constantly busy and see every diagnosis possible and do all kinds of crazy things. Never a dull moment!

mama2 · Jan 27, 2013

I love my job at a community health center! I have a ton of freedom, get to do a lot of patient teaching, dressing changes, suture removal, immunizations, coumadin clinic, routine sick visits like UTI's, flu swabs, and sore throats, etc. My favorite part is knowing that my assessment skills and patient teaching help keep our clients OUT of the hospital. :)