DNP but still a staff nurse?

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Specializes in RN, BSN, PHN, CCM, CMCN, PAHM, MSHS.

Hello everyone, I currently work as a Staff RN Case Manager for one of the large insurance companies here in the US and they have a partnership with Capella for a DNP program. I inquired and got some good feedback from their enrollement advisor and it is making me now more determined to pursue my doctoral degree, however I am a little reluctant because I am a staff and I am not in a management or leadership position. I guess you can say I am a little over the fence too because I am a bit embarrassed if I will remain as a staff with doctoral degree. Do you think it is worth to get while I remain as a staff? Any opinion will be helpful and thank you.

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Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.

I don't know if it's worth it for you or not. But I can tell you that at my hospital we have quite a few bedside staff RNs with DNPs. My hospital has a generous tuition assistance program so many nurses have taken advantage of it. 3 years full time work is required if the hospital pays for your degree. Since there seems to be hardly and new grad NP jobs available in the area those nurses stay at their bedside jobs.

   Nobody cares. Their degree counts for nothing in a staff RN roll. Nobody has higher expectations for them.

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Specializes in RN, BSN, PHN, CCM, CMCN, PAHM, MSHS.

This is actually good to know, thank you. I want to advance my degree and further down the road also advance in my career. I am happy to know that expectations are not exactly "higher" (but of course still doing your job counts). 
I am gathering feedback and experience from RNs who have obtained a DNP or who knows anyone with a doctoral degree but remained a staff. Your feedback is very much appreciated. 

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Specializes in CTICU.
On 11/8/2021 at 11:27 PM, purplecali said:

Hello everyone, I currently work as a Staff RN Case Manager for one of the large insurance companies here in the US and they have a partnership with Capella for a DNP program. I inquired and got some good feedback from their enrollement advisor 

FYI - Capella is a private for-profit school, so all you will get from enrolment advisors is good feedback - their job is to get students signed up. I wouldn't do the doctorate unless it's going to help you in some way.

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Specializes in oncology.
On 11/9/2021 at 12:30 AM, PMFB-RN said:

But I can tell you that at my hospital we have quite a few bedside staff RNs with DNPs. My hospital has a generous tuition assistance program so many nurses have taken advantage of it

I gotta say "how tough was the DNP program with development of a theses, 

research and academics. You can do this while working full time? Go to a school this is reputable. Why weren't these DNPs grabbed up at their clinical sites?

51 minutes ago, ghillbert said:

Capella is a private for-profit school, so all you will get from enrolment advisors is good feedback - their job is to get students signed up.

 

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Specializes in oncology.
On 11/9/2021 at 12:30 AM, PMFB-RN said:

. But I can tell you that at my hospital we have quite a few bedside staff RNs with DNPs. My hospital has a generous tuition assistance program so many nurses have taken advantage of it

Yeh, that got those RNs were they wanted to be, didn't it? Capella and the hospital is "just keeping you busy" so you don't look elsewhere/ 

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Specializes in Primary Care; Child Advocacy; Child Abuse; ED.

I believe your DNP or any other degree is as strong as the program you went to. Everyone in my ASN (RN) and MSN (FNP) had jobs a semester before we graduated. I went to Cox College. If they had a DNP I would have done it with them. I got my DNP at the University of San Francisco and was also offered jobs before graduation. 
 

Your degree is something you have to do more than study for. You have to pick a program that is going to work for you. Find out if people who graduated from the program you are interested in are working, did they feel like they learned what was supposed to be taught. Don’t go to schools were the graduates are not getting hired and they don’t feel like they gain the knowledge that is needed to practice nursing. 
 

There are plenty unemployed nurses or APRNs that are still at bedside. There are so many reasons for this. Just do what you want to do.
 

When I started as an RN I made $17.00 an hour and now I make over $350,000 a year as a professor and as a NP/manager. So happy to only work 40 hours a week! I am constantly offered new positions and have never felt like I could not get a good job! I had to many injuries in the military so I won’t go back to bedside. Money isn’t the marker of whether I am successful but happiness in my role and me feeling like my degrees were worth it, is priceless to me. 
 

Good luck to you in your future endeavors! 

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Specializes in school nurse.
On 11/8/2021 at 11:27 PM, purplecali said:

 I am a bit embarrassed if I will remain as a staff with doctoral degree. 

Never be embarrassed to be doing actual nursing instead of paper-pushing...

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