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Discussion

Dilemma

I am a nurse practitioner (3 years experience) working in endocrine and I am now wanting to work in an acute care (urgent care) setting. As a RN I worked in the operating room and believe this was detrimental to developing basic acute care skills.

I am now considering working as an ER nurse for a while to enhance, learn additional skills and then transition back to FNP role in urgent care setting. However, I am concerned that if I go "backwards" I will have a difficult time finding a job as an FNP.

Any thoughts on this? Would working as ER nurse be a great forum for acquiring the skills to make this transition?

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    • Featured Replies

    As an ER nurse going for FNP, I don't think I'd recommend this... for example, in some of the ER settings where I work, most NP's take the "urgent care" patients: stitches, splints, UTI, etc. Working in an ER as an RN, there is no guarantee that you will be doing these cases.... in fact, if you worked as an RN with these pts, you are medicating for pain and very often the CNA or FNP/PA is splinting. Can you find an urgent care with a decent orientation period?

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    I'm not a nurse in the ER or urgent care, or a practitioner yet, but as far as skills go, your skills in the urgent care would be different in the provider role vs the bedside nurse role. I feel like it would possibly give you more experience with the patient populations, but like PP said, you don't really know what all you'll see, and to really get experience of all, it's gonna take a long time. In other words, unless you are planning on doing this(bedside RN) for years, I doubt it would be truly beneficial.

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    • Author

    Thank you for your input. I have yet to find an urgent care with an orientation program, but will continue to look.

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    • Author

    Thanks! Have not found orientation program as of yet, but will continue to look.

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    • Author

    Thank you!

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    • Experts

    I agree with others. You are an experienced NP so just make sure you have a solid orientation and I think you will do fine. You might look at the ENA (Emergency Nurses Association) website as they have a lot of info on it.

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    • Author

    Thank you

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