Can I work in a hospital as a FNP?

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Hello,

I am in FNP school and have heard that you cannot work in a hospital setting as a FNP.

Is this true?

What have you seen?

I've seen FNP's work in a hospital but they said it's because they had lots of experience……?

Any FNP's out there currently working in the hospital? If so, how do you like it? Are the hours good?

Thanks in advance ;)

MallysMama said:
I've never seen a regular family med doc work in the ICU. We have intensivists here. (And where I lived before- the only family med docs who admitted pts to ICU were ones who specialized in pulmonary medicine and had been doing it for decades.)

FNP programs teach vasopressors, tpa, central line insertion, LPs, intubation, CRRT, how to present a patient on rounds, etc?? Guess I didn't realize that- I thought they were ONLY taught primary care management.

I was being sarcastic/facicious towards the argument that techinically since there aren't huge legal scope of practice issues with FNPs in inpatient roles (ICU, hospitalist etc) that they should reguarly hired in those positions.

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Specializes in ICU.
Dranger said:
I was being sarcastic/facicious towards the argument that techinically since there aren't huge legal scope of practice issues with FNPs in inpatient roles (ICU, hospitalist etc) that they should reguarly hired in those positions.

Ah! Gotcha! Sorry I missed the sarcasm!

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Alicia777 said:
Hi Dee,

Yes, I was an OR nurse before this as well. Yes, in my state an RN (or NP) must have their RNFA to first assist. It's really not that arduous a task, the course was a week and then you have to find a surgeon to oversee your progress for 175 hours, other programs the hours may vary slightly.

I assist in mainly general and Ortho cases (total joints, lap chole etc). I got the job just by being persistent really. My husband worked on the corporate side so I personally emailed my soon to be boss. I figured the worst he could tell me was to get lost, ha!

PM me if you'd like any more deets..

The RNFA program was only a week (other than the clinical)? Can you please tell me where you attended?

Thanks!

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If in doubt check with your state BON and maybe whatever hospital you desire to work for. My FNP did not teach me critical care content or line placements. I had background in critical care and then checked off on line placement and various other procedures by my supervising physicians. I think it would have been much harder to transition not coming from a ICU background but it is not impossible and many FNPs practice in acute care settings all over the place.

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Lala72 said:
The RNFA program was only a week (other than the clinical)? Can you please tell me where you attended?

Thanks!

I'm assuming she meant the lab component of the RNFA program was 1 week. I will be starting an RNFA program this fall and it's a semester of online didactic work with 1 week on campus doing hands on training, then a semester of clinical work. All the programs I researched were set up this way, including the NIFA program which doesn't have a traditional campus, but instead holds their training week in different cities/venues across the country.

PM me if you'd like more information. I want more and more RN/NPs to start completing these programs and offer competition to PAs in the OR.

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Specializes in Psychiatric/Mental Health, Med-Surg, Corrections.
DeeRN,BSN said:
Alicia,

I was very interested in being a surgical FNP as well. I worked in the OR as an RN, now Im in the ICU, but would love to be back in the surgical setting as a FNP. Do you have to have your RNFA to first assist the surgeon?? What kind of surgery are you in and how did you get that job?.... if you don't mind me asking ?

you should also look into PA school - here in CA they often hire PAs to assist in surgery. UCD also has a dual FNP/PA program.

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Yes. Absolutely. Unless your state specifies they cant. Np programs all teach you to assess and diagnose the same. No more no less. I'm in an FNP program and I'm doing all of my clinical in inpatient setting....ICU, internal medicine etc. Because that's what I wanna do. I applied to acute care NP and FNP and accepted FNP because it's not limited. You can treat all ages and this isn't the case with acute care NP'S. IF you are FNP student and wanna do acute care , focus your clinical around it to get the experience and include it on your resume when applying for acute care jobs.

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