Any advice for someone interested in women's health

not2bblue · Dec 21, 2015

Wow. You've done a lot. It may or may not give you any advantage when job searching. As a new grad, you have the same experience as those who have not done anything at all and that is what the nurse manager will be looking at the most. Your enthusiasm is great though! If you want to do L&D at any point in your career I would NOT suggest going to any outpatient setting, especially to start. Many facilities prefer not to hire nurses who have not worked in a hospital in over a year (or ever) and it is 10X as hard to get in. The hospital may or may not require one year of med surg before moving into a specialty. The best thing for you to do is look at the job openings so you know what they are looking for to fill the position. If you are willing to move, increase your search to find a place that has a new grad program. If you want to work in women's health, this is my advice: Get a starting position in L&D. You can be trained and float to NICU or postpartum. Many hospitals are doing LDRP, so they would look at L&D experience as more helpful than PP since that is a less acute area. After a few years you may want to work in outpatient, however most ob/gyns do not need an RN in the office since they can use an MA or LPN to do the same thing and get paid less. Oh and most Dr offices will pay the RN less than the hospital, but the hours are better... Are you planning on becoming a CNM? I would still suggest the same path (start in L&D) so that you get good experience under your belt. Good luck.

blackribbon · Jan 13, 2016

I was hired on a women's gyn/med/surg unit at a large hospital after getting 6 months med/surg experience at a very small hospital (I loved that hospital but they couldn't give me enough hours). My floor does hire new grads, usually preferring the ones who already passed their NCLEX so they don't train someone and have them not pass (and you can't get a code for the pyxis until you are an RN). I would never have applied for my position if I didn't have someone tell me to apply because it was listed as a Clinical II position for nurses with 2 years experience....but they hired me with 6 months and my friend straight out of school one month later. It never hurts to apply for a position that you would like...even if you don't think you qualify. Be honest on your application and let them weed out what they don't want to waste time with. Now after being here for 1 year, I have been offered the opportunity to cross train to postpartum so I can work both units and manage postpartum overflow onto our unit. And I never turn down a chance to cross train. I am also a psych nurse for that reason because my other hospital needed someone to float prn (and I still do contingent work in that hospital when I can).