Army Nurse Corps FY2013

Specialties Government

Published

Hey everybody, I'm starting a thread here for those applying to the Army Nurse Corps in FY2013. I figure this might be a good place to get to know other future nurse corps officers and a place for the veterans of the ANC to pass on some advice.

Share your story and hopefully we will meet down in San Antonio this Winter/spring of 2013

Ill start with my story,

I am a 28 y/o critical care nurse with 2 years experience in a level 2 trauma center in Virignia. I passed MEPS at Ft. Eustis and have submitted security packet, letters of reference and letter of intent.

I am applying to the October review board for Active Duty Army Nurse Corps for the 66H8A(critical care) and 66T(trauma) programs( I am not sure if they are still running this one, but you don't get what you don't ask for).

I am happily married with a baby on the way, my wife is 100% behind a move the Army and I feel blessed to have her love and support.

The road to the Army has been a long one with a degree in Biology, stint as a drug rep and return for an accelerated BSN.

I love being a nurse and love working in critical care. I hope to serve my country in uniform treating service members & their families at home and in forward deployed units.

I want to be an critical care nurse and officer in the U.S. Army and I hope that I will get to meet all of you in uniform at BOLC, at MEDDAC, CSH or FST in CONUS or OCONUS.

Here's to all us achieving our dreams of becoming Army Nurses!

HOOOOOOAH!

Specializes in ICU.

Hello everyone! Not sure about stunt from above but I wanted to introduce myself. My name is Blair and I am a ROTC graduate from creighton university in Omaha, NE. I will be commissioning and going to BOLC in August or October. I'm interested in goin the M5 route and eventually trying to get onto a SORT team once I have the experience. Good luck to all of you

Blair

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Emergency.
I'm prior service Air Force and Army and currently on my third year of a 5 year ADSO as an AN (1LT). I'm telling you now turn around and go back Army nursing sucks!!! It's a parallel universe compared to civilian nursing! I was where you were at , except I was in the ANCP program, did BOLC, I mean drunkfest, at Sam Houston. Yep go directly passed GO and Do not collect 200. It's a joke! Its all old school nursing from the 80's, everything from equipment to team nursing, and oh lets not forget the furlough taking affect 16 Jun!! Yep be prepared to work long hours and yea your days off are not your days off!! You have to come in to the hospital and do APEQS training as well as all your other appointments plus mandatoary volunteering into the community and mandatory fun time. Yep welcome to Army nursing suckaaa!!![/quote']

ArmyCRNA2B at the risk of stating the obvious you are being "that LT" on a public forum. I will try to PM the rest of my comments that are direct for you:)

For all the new peeps at BOLC now or waiting on orders:

I do agree that there are a TON of things the Army can do to improve MULTIPLE things, but I don't want to discourage those that are just starting out. Every post, facility and leadership chain is different, and command climates change over time.

Adjusting to ANC life at a MEDDAC versus Level 1 civilian trauma center is a huge adjustment in itself, not to mention enlisted to officer, and the other number of things that you will be forced to adjust to as a new LT. I have to admit I lost my focus a little and was sucked into the BS. Now it is time to learn from those mistakes, move on and continue to grow.

Use your first assignment as a learning phase and sit back and watch the other officers that are around you. You will quickly find out who is about business and who is not. You will also encounter different types of leaders, tuck away the good traits for future use and learn what not to do from the bad.

It has been a super long time since I have posted (sorry LunahRN), but I am headed to Korea soon, so if anyone is going PM me.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in EMS, ED, Trauma, CEN, CPEN, TCRN.
It has been a super long time since I have posted (sorry LunahRN), but I am headed to Korea soon, so if anyone is going PM me.

It is great to see you back! :D I know you have good perspective on what ArmyCRNA2B is experiencing, too.

The bottom line is that there is BS in ANY job, civilian or military. There will always be inefficiencies in the system, there will always be some jerks in the ivory tower -- they just make the gems that much shinier. :) As Gandhi said, "Be the change that you wish to see in the world."

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Hello everyone! Not sure about stunt from above but I wanted to introduce myself. My name is Blair and I am a ROTC graduate from creighton university in Omaha, NE. I will be commissioning and going to BOLC in August or October. I'm interested in goin the M5 route and eventually trying to get onto a SORT team once I have the experience. Good luck to all of you

Blair

Hi Blair! I did ROTC as well and commissioned in Dec. I have no idea when I'm going to BOLC the only thing I've been told is it won't be NLT then Oct *the frustration I'm feeling. But if you don't mind me asking what is the M5 route?

Hi Bl

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in EMS, ED, Trauma, CEN, CPEN, TCRN.

M5 = ER nurse. :-)

Up Vote Up Vote ×
M5 = ER nurse. :-)

Thank you!

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in EMT, ER, Homehealth, OR.

Before people say that the military facilities do not have the equipment/supplies d staffing to do there jobs have not worked at a civilian hospital. I have worked at 6 civilian hospitals and the Army hospitals have been the best equipped and staffed. at a civilian hospital when census is low staff is sent home not at Army hospital. The staffing ratio is much better at a Army hospital, have never heard of a nurse taking a 10-12 patient load. Yes there are a lot of issues with Army nursing and one of the major ones is as a nurse finally has a decent amount of experience the are pulled away from the bedside

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in EMT, ER, Homehealth, OR.
I'm prior service Air Force and Army and currently on my third year of a 5 year ADSO as an AN (1LT). I'm telling you now turn around and go back, Army nursing sucks!!! It's a parallel universe compared to civilian nursing! I was where you were at , except I was in the ANCP program, did BOLC, I mean drunkfest, at Sam Houston. Yep go directly passed GO and Do not collect 200. It's a joke! Its all old school nursing from the 80's, everything from equipment to team nursing, and oh lets not forget the furlough taking affect 16 Jun!! Yep be prepared to work long hours and yea your days off are not your days off!! You have to come in to the hospital and do APEQS training as well as all your other appointments plus mandatoary volunteering into the community and mandatory fun time. Yep welcome to Army nursing suckaaa!!!

nursing is nursing no matter where you do it. There are very few places that you can control your schedule, you can ask but it not mean you will get it. Is it Army nursing or nursing in general you do not like? If you are prior vice there should have been no surprises about mandatory training on your days off, or mandatory fun.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in EMS, ED, Trauma, CEN, CPEN, TCRN.
Yes there are a lot of issues with Army nursing and one of the major ones is as a nurse finally has a decent amount of experience the are pulled away from the bedside

This is one of the (very few, thankfully) complaints I have, overall. And it makes me very glad that I came into the Army with nursing experience! Trying to develop solid nursing skills while also developing effective leadership is difficult in such a relatively short period of time; one may suffer at the expense of the other.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Hello everyone! Not sure about stunt from above but I wanted to introduce myself. My name is Blair and I am a ROTC graduate from creighton university in Omaha, NE. I will be commissioning and going to BOLC in August or October. I'm interested in goin the M5 route and eventually trying to get onto a SORT team once I have the experience. Good luck to all of you

Blair

Hi Blair, I'm considering going the ROTC route and was wondering if you could share your experiences. What was it like doing nursing school AND ROTC? My school's ROTC says they will work with my schedule, but I'm wondering if all the extra stuff will detract from the nursing part. Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

Up Vote Up Vote ×

I am active duty army and have one year left to get my BSN. I am working on a med-surge floor at one of the larger military facilities this summer. So far it has been a pretty interesting experience. All the nurses on the floor come from different branches of service. They all seem to get along really well and there is no drama that I can see. The floor is very different from the med-surge floor at my university hospital. The biggest difference I see between civilian and military at this hospital is the work load. The med-surge nurses at the civilian hospital seemed to average about 6 patients per nurse and the nurses at the military facility seemed to have 3 to 4 patients. I am not going to lie, I get bored during my 12 hours on the floor. You can only assess, document, pass meds, and do comfort round for patients so often. It really seems like there are too many nurses on the floor at one time. Is this isolated or is it like that throughout all the military facilities?

Up Vote Up Vote ×

I have worked civilian ICU and military ICU and have floated to the floor at times. "Generally" speaking I have noticed that staff throughout the hospital in-patient wards are not balanced optimally vs. civilian sector. I would take 2-3 patients or 2 easier patients and the code bed in civ world vs 1-2 patients in military. Some may say you cannot compare the two equally, and yes there are major demands on military personnel not just bedside care which is true. But, there is lots of room for better manpower management. Things will change, I honk it's happening now faster because of the pressure to lower costs. I was shocked at how low the patient nurse ratio even when acuity was factored in when I joined the military. Lots of boring days, but I am not complaining at all. But if I was a CEO of that hospital I would be fired quickly because the biggest cost in healthcare is your people. And if you don't manage that correctly them you fail. But, we haven't had to worry about our costs due to wars and blank check we have been given. Things are moving more joint now with bases and even with command for increased efficiency. All militAry medicine is going to be under one command. Anyways. I am rambling.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
+ Add a Comment