Do you find that Nursing school was alot harder than actually working as a Rn?

Roseyposey · Oct 31, 2007

Why and how? Please share..

I can honestly say that nursing school vs. my orientation as an RN was a cake walk. The learning curve is much steeper once I hit the floor. In nursing school, you have one patient that you prepare for, you look up meds, you look up pathophys, you study their chart. I'm not discounting the fact that nursing school is tough, so nobody flame me, please. In my opinion, working as a (new) RN is much more demanding.

TraumaGirl1018 · Oct 31, 2007

:uhoh21:nooooooooooooooooooo

SICU Queen · Oct 31, 2007

Nursing school is difficult at times because you're having to absorb a ton of information... but more difficult than actually working as an RN?

Well, it's just... so different!

As an experienced nurse, I'm still constantly in a learning mode, and while I feel quite at ease with the basics of nursing care, every day presents new and unique challenges that *I* am responsible for handling, without an instructor backing me up.

Nursing school is hard... but so is "real" nursing. There are similarities between the two but honestly, I do think that school is much easier compared to what you deal with while working as an RN.

EmmaG, RN · Oct 31, 2007

Do you find that Nursing school was alot harder than actually working as a Rn?

Absolutely not.

ERRNTraveler, RN · Oct 31, 2007

Working as an RN is harder than nursing school, hands down.... but I still love it!

BeachBayNurse · Oct 31, 2007

Yes and no. As an RN you have ALOT more responsiblity and work to do while on the floor. You will have to move 10x faster than you did while doing school clinicals. However, I felt that while I was in school the guidance I recieved at clinicals was not the best, as an RN, during training I recieved excellent help. As a student it was very stressful going to clinicals and not knowing much, being the last person given the charts after the doctors and nurses had them, being graded on the assignments and also having to go to class.

Ayvah, RN · Oct 31, 2007

One of the hardest things about nursing school is the sheer amount of time it takes, time away from your family, to accomplish what needs to be done.

As a nurse, you get to be with your family when you get home, however, the time at work is harder. You are much more involved with the patients' care and are responsible for lives. Due to problems such as short staffing, it is a very common complaint that nurses are not able to give the kind of care they want to the patient.

Nurses are pressured to be martyrs. You will find many nurses who skip lunches or take severely shortened ones, who aren't always able to go to the bathroom when they need to, and who get yelled at for overtime. We are expected to take care of a sicker population with inadequate staff, and both the patient and nurse suffer as a result.

Of course things are different in different environments, and my post mainly focuses on bedside nursing

GeminiTwinRN, BSN · Oct 31, 2007

One of the hardest things about nursing school is the sheer amount of time it takes, time away from your family, to accomplish what needs to be done.
As a nurse, you get to be with your family when you get home, however, the time at work is harder. You are much more involved with the patients' care and are responsible for lives. Due to problems such as short staffing, it is a very common complaint that nurses are not able to give the kind of care they want to the patient.
Nurses are pressured to be martyrs. You will find many nurses who skip lunches or take severely shortened ones, who aren't always able to go to the bathroom when they need to, and who get yelled at for overtime. We are expected to take care of a sicker population with inadequate staff, and both the patient and nurse suffer as a result.
Of course things are different in different environments, and my post mainly focuses on bedside nursing

yeah that. count me in as one of the martyrs. i haven't taken a lunch in the last 7 shifts, where i clocked in at 0653 and out at 2230 for three straight shifts, and not much better the others. it's an insane pace that we run. short staffed, extremely high acuity, not enough techs, and no time for breaks. had i taken a lunch break on any of those days, i wouldn't have left until after 2300! then back up at 0430 again to do it over.

in a word, the answer to your question from my POV.

NO!

nursing school is a different animal. you are learning. as an RN, you will be DOING. there won't be anyone there to hold your hand while you draw up a dose of ______. it will be you who is watching your patient decompensate. it will be you who is desperately trying to get the residents to understand that YOU have been with this pt. for days, and the changes that you see are life threatening, and need to be addressed with more than 2 units of PRBC.

enjoy school as much as you can while you're in it. it's tough, no question. depending on where you work when you're out, you may not have the issues i've described. i work at a level 1 trauma center on a step down unit. there are plenty of jobs out there that wouldn't be nearly as stressful - i mean, i could work outpt. endo.. .. that's up to you. :)

good luck! may the force be with you!

rn undisclosed name · Oct 31, 2007

I don't know if I would use the work "hard". For me it's almost like 2 different worlds. In school you had the time to look something up because you had only 1 or 2 patients and you came prepared. On the floor you don't have time to look stuff up and I rely on the people I work with when I'm not sure. Occassionally I have the time to look stuff up. Now don't get me wrong I don't give a med or do anything I'm not sure on. When I was done with orientation and went on my own I was having panic attacks (or what I would perceive as panic attacks since I was never diagnosed) in the am while getting ready to go to work. This lasted a couple of months. Luckily they went away on the ride to work and while sitting in report. I still had people to help me and I don't know why I was like that. I never had panic attacks while in school. I was nervous with my instructors.

I am so glad I am done with school. While everything is given to learn from it is so nice to be able to have a life and have days off. Yes I do still look things up when I get home and I am constantly learning.

Curious1alwys, BSN, RN · Oct 31, 2007

I can honestly say that nursing school vs. my orientation as an RN was a cake walk. The learning curve is much steeper once I hit the floor. In nursing school, you have one patient that you prepare for, you look up meds, you look up pathophys, you study their chart. I'm not discounting the fact that nursing school is tough, so nobody flame me, please. In my opinion, working as a (new) RN is much more demanding.

:yeahthat: Being an RN...at least for the FIRST YEAR absolutely has to be harder than nursing school. It is a whole different beast. It won't get better after school so don't count on that. My recommendation is don't get a job till you get your license. You get paid more once you are licensed. Plus, you'll have time to study for NCLEX. It was hard to begin work as a new RN, try to absorb all the new info, AND study for NCLEX. All the while you are making less $$. That is why I say just kick it until you get your license! Take a month to study if you can, chill, and then jump into the fire. :lol2:

GOOD LUCK in school!

MichaelFloridaRN · Oct 31, 2007

yes and no

It was much easier having only one or two patients to concentrate on and being expected to know everything about them, compared to the real thing were you wish you had the time to at least find out what you really need to know !

In nursing school the hardest part was doing a care plan with 6 nursing diagnosis's that one one really cares about, and other busy paper work like the psych progress reporting notes we had to do.