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Discussion

Career path to ICU

I am a nursing student who is interested (not decided) in ICU/critical care nursing. I have been searching the forums on here for an hour and can't seem to find the answer to my question.

In my area there is no way that a new grad will be hired onto an ICU unit. Not only do I want to be an ICU nurse but I want to be a great, well prepared ICU nurse. So my question is, what type of unit would best prepare me? I have a job waiting for me when I graduate in a medsurg/tele unit but I'm not sure if that would be the best choice.

Any opinions? Anyone know what type of nurses critical care managers typically like to hire?

:)

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    If your local hospitals have a progressive care or step down unit, that would be a better segway than a general medical surgical unit, I think. Although with the general medical surgical units, you'll be exposed to a little of everything. With your PCUs and SDUs, you'll have more cardiac and respiratory related illness which translates well when you are attempting to transition. I would also think the emergency department would be good exposure to all illness and injury. I know in my ED, we do a lot of hands on skills and we really need to think because of the Doctor is held up in another room, we can't afford to delay care. So I'm constantly thinking "ok, this patient will need this this and this" (not medication unless it's Tylenol or Zofran but rather tests and interventions). Additionally, o deal with septic patients, patients on bipap and vents, and a lot of overdose, trauma, and cardiac patients (which i dealt with a lot when I was in the ICU setting).

    No matter what, you can't go wrong. It just depends on how you want to learn and what exposure you want.

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    If your local hospitals have a progressive care or step down unit, that would be a better segway than a general medical surgical unit, I think. Although with the general medical surgical units, you'll be exposed to a little of everything. With your PCUs and SDUs, you'll have more cardiac and respiratory related illness which translates well when you are attempting to transition. I would also think the emergency department would be good exposure to all illness and injury. I know in my ED, we do a lot of hands on skills and we really need to think because of the Doctor is held up in another room, we can't afford to delay care. So I'm constantly thinking "ok, this patient will need this this and this" (not medication unless it's Tylenol or Zofran but rather tests and interventions). Additionally, o deal with septic patients, patients on bipap and vents, and a lot of overdose, trauma, and cardiac patients (which i dealt with a lot when I was in the ICU setting).

    No matter what, you can't go wrong. It just depends on how you want to learn and what exposure you want.

    Thank you for your reply. I feel like it's so hard to land an ICU job in my area!

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