Clinicals

Simplistic · May 20, 2017

At my school, we get to pick which clinical site we would like to go to. For the past 2 semesters, I chose the one that was 5 minutes away from me. No problem.

Purple_roses · May 20, 2017

When I was in school, they tried to send us to the closer one. However, they also let us choose people we wanted to be in clinical with. I always got put at the further clinical sites, but I got to do almost every single clinical throughout school with my friends, and that made it worth it. Lots of memories together!

Also, I cared more about the facility I was going to than the drive. There was one rotation where I felt like I was driving to Timbuktu, but I had an absolutely incredible clinical experience...the site was amazing and I learned more than I would have if I had been assigned to one of the closer sites.

But I'm sure it wouldn't hurt to ask someone at the other clinical site if they'd be willing to switch with you.

Editorial Team / Admin · May 20, 2017

Just because it's 3-5 minutes from you doesn't mean that it made the most sense to send you there. There may be students who were 45 minutes from there who for them made it a shorter trip to go there. It could be random or it could be clinical coordinators trying to make sure no one had an obscene commute while someone only had 35 minutes if they could both have 35 minutes. That was how it was for my psych rotation- I was only 15 minutes from one site and 45 from the other. However, for many my closest site was 45 minutes for them and the other was an hour and a half. I was assigned the site that was a 45 minute drive for me. Would it not be fair for all students to have commuted about 45 minutes? In the grand scheme of things, this is a non-issue.

The only clinicals where I was able to choose my site was when I opted to take an evening clinical- instead of being at the hospital 15 minutes from my house and 5 minutes from the school, I drove an hour. It was a much larger center where patients that couldn't be managed at the nearby hospital were sent.

Ilikeletters · May 21, 2017

Our first clinical rotations were assigned and they tried to do them based on where you lived, but if more than 10 people live close to a certain hospital, some have to go to a different one. After that, you were allowed to request - you put down first and second choice hospitals and days of the week, and specified which was more important. Then they assigned based on GPA - so the highest GPA got their first choice. Most people ended up getting their first or second choice.

alwayslulu · May 21, 2017

My clinicals have always been assigned to me. We don't get a choice of who or where we go.

verene, MSN · May 21, 2017

We are allowed to rank our choices, we can make comment about commute or transportation issues but that is not a heavily weighted factor in the decision process.

ADN_Is_Complete, ADN · May 22, 2017

Yeah mine are also that wayí ½í¸•

Kuriin, BSN, RN · May 22, 2017

Ours were assigned. We were given no choice.

augurey · May 22, 2017

For the most part we were at one hospital. A few other times we went to the other affiliate hospital - it didn't matter where you lived, it's just where you got sent. I have no idea how they chose our units or how they chose who went to which hospital, but I do know that when we were on one unit for the entirety of the semester, you just went where they sent you, not necessarily if you lived closer etc. Though the two hospitals were about 20 minutes from each other.

During the last two semesters (med surg III and critical care), we rotated between hospitals, so everyone ended up pretty much at each place.

The specialty areas were a little different - psych, OB and peds. Some aspects were one location only (like where there was only one clinical for that specific location to see the different aspects of psych, etc), but otherwise, there were a few locations we could've gone. Before the start of the semester, they'd tell us each of the locations that we could potentially end up at. They had everyone pick their first, second, and third (etc) choices. They tried to accommodate as many people as possible - though sometimes they were unable to as they had to look and see if one location was potentially a scheduling conflict with another clinical or class.

So those they tried to go by student preference if they could manage, but otherwise we had no choice in where we went if there were more than one location.

SaltySarcasticSally, LPN, RN · May 22, 2017

My commute for clinical was almost always over 30 minutes, mostly an hour but I live further than most students. I think there is a policy in our hand book that they can be 2 hours away if need be.

BSN_to_ICU · May 22, 2017

We had absolutely no say in choosing out sites. Most of mine were at least 30 minutes away (and yes I live 5 minutes from the hospital in town). I also had sites up to and hour and 15 minutes away.