Chronic or Acute dialysis experience before doing traveling

[chill598]

Hi,

I recently graduated from nursing school this past May and I have recently starting working as a Charge Nurse at a dialysis center that treats patients with chronic renal failure. I would like to do travel nursing as a dialysis nurse, and I was told that you need at least one year of experience before you can travel. My plan is to do Chronic dialysis nursing for six months to learn that side of dialysis and I planned on doing six months of acute dialysis to work more with patients that are sicker. Do you all think that this is a wise decision to do before traveling or should I just stick with chronic? Will it look bad on my resume to just stay for six months? Please Help!

[nomadness]

my wife has 20 years in dialysis and is now doing chronic after being in an acute unit and hates it 30 patients in chronic, 5 patients in acute. but you need more time before you travel

[LH19rn]

BellaCerra, it sounds like you found a good company to get started in dialysis. I would like to find a company that takes it slow and is not going to put me in charge. I have been dissapointed after reading all the posts on Davita. I thought they would be the best company to get training in dialysis. What company are you working for and where are you located. I am in Los Angeles and I am really wanting to find a good unit to get experience in chronic dialysis and then move up to acutes.

[LH19rn]

Chill598, please what company trained you for six months? How are you currently doing? Are you doing acutes now? Is it overwhelming for someone with no ER/ICU or at least Med-Surg. background? I am debating whether to start in chronic dialysis or a new grad med-surgical program. So many nurses dont want to do med-surg due to how busy it is. During this economy, not many hospitals are doing new grad programs. They all want at least one year of recent acute care experience. If I decide to do med-surg first I would have to apply at San Diego even though I am in Los Angeles because they are willing to train a bilingual nurse. I am trying to decide if I really need the med-surg experience. Please give me your insight based on your experience. If you prefer please email me privately [email protected]. Thank you.

[kanake]

I would do acutes too. It's a little different. This way you will have a better feel for both just in case you get a job at a hospital that has both and has you up in the unit then down doing ICU runs. You will have to hook up your own RO tanks etc, at most places if you do acutes in hospitals...

[kanake]

I agree about Davita. I thought it was going to be a great company to work for also. I had less than one day (8 hrs) of training with a preceptor who was too busy doing her own thing and was put working a full pod the next day and didn't even have the computer down yet! I have also worked at Fresinus. You get much better training there and they pay well also. The best company in my opinion though is RCG...Renal Care Group. Most of them were bought out, but there are still a few around from what I hear. I had good training and they treat their employees very well. Good luck to all!