Do hospitals consider experience as an LVN when hiring for RN positions?

[Anonymous666]

I have 8 years experience as an LVN in Texas. Med surg, wound care/home health, LTAC, IMU. I can pretty much hit the ground running in most med surg areas in an RN role.

I will graduate with my BSN this semester. The program keeps pushing these "graduate nursing programs" that the big hospitals here provide for new grad RN hires. I don't want to enter into one of these programs, because I'm not a new nurse. I also don't want to earn the same as I was when I was an RN, which is what these programs pay.

I know there's a hospital here that considers your LVN experience (if in a certain acute care area) as RN experience when deciding on what they will pay.

I'm just wondering if anyone has had any experience with this?

I can always work at my current LTAC hospital as a BSN in IMU and train for ICU and make a very good wage that would take into account my experience, but I was looking at taking advantage of graduating from a prestigious BSN program and getting some time in at one of the big fancy hospitals.

[Mhays]

Congratulations on earning your BSN. That is a wonderful thing. I think that professors in the BSN program want you to think about your masters degree or just think and weigh your options about obtaining a masters degree. If you do not want to get a masters degree, that is totally fine. If you are happy with what you have accomplished and done, then that is totally fine. Getting your BSN takes a lot of courage and hard work. I also believe that your LVN experience will help you greatly since you worked as one for 8 years. I would ask the hospital HR department or any director of nursing supervisor that you know and see what they say. I believe that they would say that your experience as an LVN would help you and you can be a BSN and work at the hospital. I would ask though your hospital supervisor just to make sure. I wish you the best. Good luck in your future endeavors as a nurse. Sounds like you have some great plans ahead of you. Marcy CNA

[inthecosmos, BSN, MSN, RN, APRN]

At the local hospitals in my area, LPN experience factors in both pay and experience accepted. It would heavily depend on the area, I would think.

I understand where you are coming from when you say "hit the ground running." In many facilities, while there are pay differences and obvious job descriptions, the LPNs and RNs do the same job with the same expectations.

Maybe call around to local HR departments for where you're looking and just ask!

[Anonymous666]

Thank you for all the responses.

I spoke with my supervisor from the job I left to finish my BSN program. He advised me to go back there (an LTAC hospital in the med center) and work IMU/Med-surg or 3 months then take their training program for the ICU, work there for a year then go wherever. He said he and the other supervisors want me back and would write letters of recommendation to ensure I get the pay I deserve. He said I should be able to get around $80K.

The residency programs at the big flashy hospitals pay $53k base rate for the entire year.

It will be a heavy load at the LTAC. Most of the patients are pre or post transplant. Most are on vents with some LVADS, so I would be doing basically the same job for about a $26k/year pay increase. That is until I train for ICU. They wanted to train me for ICU when I was an LVN there, but I was not comfortable managing drips as an LVN with an RN "Overseeing" me (if you know what I mean - essentially, practicing outside my scope of practice as an LVN).

I could take a residency program at one of the big hospitals, and I'm sure I would learn a lot; but it doesn't seem worth the pay cut when I could work for a year for good money and rack up more experience with high acuity patients and then apply later.