Being offered a job in a General Surgery clinic

[brkostman]

All:

Sorry for the long post. This is kind of a train of thought post.

I'm a 42 year old male nurse with a wife and 3 kids 10, 9, and 7. I work 5 a.m. to typically 6:30 p.m.shift 3 days a week. I have been working on the same busy, stressful med/surg unit for the past 3.5+ years. My unit gets a lot of general surgery, bariatric, ortho, and urology patients along with plenty of chronic illness/cardiac/detox, you name it. This is my first job in nursing. It's a smaller, regional 120 bed hospital. For those 3.5+ years, I've worked a lot with the two general surgeons that make up one of the 2 General Surgery groups that practice at that hospital.

About 2 months ago I became very aware of just how burned out I was getting with bedside care on that unit. I got floated to the Behavioral Health unit one day to do a one-to-one with a patient in the lock down area of B.H. It was a really refreshing change from the daily med/surg grind. The director approached me that very day about working on her unit. I sat down with her a few days later for an informal discussion about the unit and about Psychiatric nursing in general. At the end of the discussion she offered me a job. I accepted it. I am still working on the med/surg unit with a tentative start date of January 3rd on the Behavioral Health unit.

A couple of weeks back I was chatting in the hallway outside a patient's room with one of the 2 general surgeons and told him that I had accepted a job on the B.H. He told me what an awesome nurse I was, that I always took great care of his patients and that he heard nothing but great things about me from his patients. He told me that he was interested in hiring an RN for his clinic and that if I changed my mind about going to B.H., that he would be very interested in having me.

Well, Friday afternoon I happened to be taking care of one of the patients of the other general surgeon in that group. He told me that I was an awesome nurse and that his patients always loved having me. He said that he was interested in hiring an RN to work in his and his partner's clinic. I told him that the other general surgeon had also commented to me a few weeks ago that he was also interested in hiring me. Surgeon #2 told me that he had no idea that Surgeon #1 had already approached me. Surgeon #2 said that if both of them had approached me independently for the same reason, then he thought that was a very good sign that they both seemed to be on the same page.

He said he thought that I would be a good fit for his group. He told me that if I was interested the next step would be speaking to his office staff about their clinic and clinic nursing in general. I told him I would have to speak with my wife and think about it over the weekend and that I'd call and speak with him on Monday.

This is an independent hospital. The numerous Doctor's clinics are directly affiliated with the hospital, meaning same pay, same benefits as any of the hospital units. It would be a lateral transfer. I'd still be a hospital employee. Bonus. I currently work 3 extra shifts every 6 week schedule as I am the only income at my house and make more in 1 extra shift (overtime plus big extra shift bonus) than I do in 2 regular shifts. My 40 hours a week working M-F in the surgeons' clinic would count as "hospital" hours. So, if I picked up an extra half shift on some Friday nights, or picked up a few Saturday or Sunday shifts, I'd get O.T. for that plus the big extra shift bonus.

Career-wise, I'm not sure what would be the best route. I have no particular love for Psychiatric nursing. I just needed to get off the med/surg unit and had zero interest in ER, ICU, surgery, or Women's/Babies, which are the only other floor gigs available at my hospital. I have been considering starting my N.P. in the next 2 years, but didn't know what kind of N.P. I was interested in being and certainly hadn't considered being some General Surgeons' group's surgical N.P. I like taking care of surgical patients a lot on the floor, but am just done with the stress of floor nursing with all the other crazy stuff that gets thrown in on top of surgeries on my unit.

Thoughts???

[CrunchRN, ADN, RN]

Just keep doing some per diem in the hospital. That way you can go back now or later. Once you leave acute care if you do not keep doing occasional shifts it is hard to get back in. Try clinic. Enjoy. Just know at some point you may get bored.

[advsmuch08]

I would suggest pursuing the clinic route. The work hours are predictable and consistent. It will still have stress, just not the kind of stress you're used to. The pace will likely be slower than that of a med/surg floor. You may get to know the patients over time. I think the clinic job will entail some education which will be great since you have the hospital perspective.

[Oedgar]

Take the clinic job since it offers the same pay as the hospital. Work per diem on either your current floor or psych.

[pfchang]

Do you have any idea which way you would like to go if you get your NP certification? That would drive my decision. The General Surgery clinic job sounds like a more unique opportunity which would not come up often. The Psych unit is more likely to have openings in the future if you decide that where you would rather be. I would probably take the Gen Surg clinic job. Good luck.

[kaiabella]

hi, just curious if anybody here worked as an LPN at a general surgery clinic and what are the procedures you have to assist? is it really busy than a dialysis clinic? thank you in advance

[ivyleaf]

go on the interview for the clinic position, learn more about it and meet the people; then make your final decision