EC CPNE Prep

There are MANY Excelsior students that do not work in acute care and sail thru without problem. I was a new LPN doing peds home health when I started in January and still working PT as a tech in the hospital to keep my foot in the door. I am now an RN on a surgical oncology unit . The nursing process and careplans are important aspects in getting thru this program and are used in every different type of patient setting. LPN's do not initiate these but you can still practice in your work setting on your patients. Good luck in your studies this is a very doable program if you're motivated and a self starter:nuke:

Oh and please don't sign ANYTHING with the college network. You don't need them to do this program! There are many threads r/t this topic. Unfortunately, I didn't know about this site until it was too late and now I'm paying for it:banghead:. I sold all my modules on ebay for a fraction of their price.

Hello,

There are many EC students who work in nursing homes, clinics etc who are not in a hospital setting that pass CPNE. I have heard not having hospital experience is an advantage because you have less bad habits to unlearn so you can re-learn the EC way. With or without hospital experience ultimately you must do the CPNE specifically as EC requires or you will fail. So download the CPNE content booklet from EC website, attend a workshop (or 2 if you can afford it), buy the skills bag, flashcards and follow EC instructions on how to pass the CPNE to the letter, reach out to peers and ask questions. ALL your experience can only serve to help you pass. Thats what I am doing. Good Luck!:wink2:

Actually, I work in a nursing home as a supervisor and even though I am an LPN I do the care plans etc... for new admits and all the nurses RN's and LPN's update the care plans with any change of condition as well as the cumulative diagnosis list.

So, you don't have to just work in a hospital setting to get care plan etc... experience.

Also, on the medicare unit we do IV's, tube feeds, wound care including wound vacs. etc... so it is possible to get the experience needed.

I would suggest working on a medicare unit in a nursing home to update your skills etc...

BJ

You can do this program if you are self motivated/self disciplined. I did purchase the TCN study guides, I can't say anything bad about them. I knew exactly to the penny what I was paying before I purchased them. I have used only them for this program and have gotten mostly A's. I have a 3.866 with EC. I added up the recommended books that EC told you to buy in 2005 it came to around $4500.00 for all 14 classess I would have needed. I paid 5810.00 to TCN. I thought the difference of $1310.00 was worth it to have the books all in advance and to have at approximately 10,000 less pages to read. The study guides are condensed versions that follow the content guides EC has almost exactly. TCN does have a guarantee that if you don't pass they will pay for a tutor, I don't know the quality or how easy it is to get them to live up to the guarantee, because I passed all my exams the first time. Make your own decision like I did. I read the posts on several websites and read bad and good about the options. The one thing that is a legitamite criticism against TCN is they do not have a workshop for the CPNE, chancellors does though. Check all your options. You can buy any of the options books, study guides used. The RN at my work went through the program using used study guides, she occasionally ran into the not being able to find what she was looking for, but only ended up paying around $3000.00 for her books for 14 classes. So you see there are many options, check them all out. List the PROS/CONS and go for it!! You will be done it no time!! Good luck!!