Direct Entry Psych Nursing

mentalhealthRN · Feb 3, 2011

You may want to find out if the jobs you would want would require clinical experience as well as the degree. Some do. Personally I think it would make you a better psych NP. Having no actual clinical experience as an RN is going to make the program tough. I have a friend who is a peds NP and she got her RN then did her NP part time while she worked in the Peds ICU. Yeah she took her time and it took her many years but she is an incredibly knowledgable and skilled peds NP now. When I applied for my BSN program it was an accelerated BSN program--a second degree program. I considered and even applied for and got accepted to the FNP program. I would have done the RN portion the first year, sat for my NCLEX then taken the next two doing the FNP portion. 3 years total. I thought a lot about it and talked to that friend a lot. She told me that yes it could be done that way but that she would not advise it. That she could not imagine going through her NP program without all she had learned working as an RN in the peds ICU--that it would have been sooooo much harder. And also advised me to be careful as many positions for NP do require a certain amount of time actually working. Not just the degree. The other thing is, I would have had to pick my NP program before starting my RN program. Without having actually spent some time in each of the areas. Back then I would have never thought I would love psych. It took me trying many areas of nursing to get there, to find my niche. So yeah it could probably be done. Is it the best path. I don't think so. I think personallyyou should get the RN first and work psych and be sure you love it first. If you do then start your psych NP part time. Good luck to you. Hope this was helpful.