How long was your orientation

Specialties Emergency

Published

Hi allnurses, I was wondering how long was your orientation. I will be working on a 23 hour observation unit and I believe my orientation will be about 4 to 6 weeks. I'm hired for on midnights and I will only spend two weeks on days, then I start nights. Do you guys think that's enough time. I'm a bit concerned as others seem to have anywhere from 8 to 12 weeks or more. I live in Michigan but please do not post there, as there is hardly any activity/response there. Any info would be greatly appreciated, thanks in advance!

12 weeks on tele as a new grad, transferred to the ED after a year & got 5 weeks

Specializes in Med/Surg, Academics.

Twelve weeks on tele as a new grad. Six weeks sounds very skimpy, IMO. However, if this is what you're getting, learn as much as you can about nursing in those six weeks. Honestly, the rest of my time during orientation was time management. Yes, that's a part of nursing, but as a new grad for the first six weeks, you are learning more of the medical side of nursing, plus skills. The rest of the time is getting your **** together! Lol. My other suggestion is to ask for orientation on days to be extended to four weeks, with two weeks on nights. Here's a way to get them to do so: tell them that they will not have to pay a shift diff while you are orienting on days, and you want to get as much exposure as possible to new orders, skills, and md communication as possible during the day. I did that, and the request was granted. FWIW, my next job as a float was one day on each unit. When you have even the least bit of experience in the same acuity environment, your orientation may be extremely short.

Specializes in ED.

I'm a new grad starting in the ED. I have 12 weeks and then I am expected to take on my own patients.

Specializes in Emergency, Trauma, Critical Care.

I had about a 4 month orientation as a New Grad in ICU. Now that I'm new to ER (Level I trauma center with 1:4 ratio, sometimes even an ICU pt stuck in the mix for a bit) I am getting a 8-10 week orientation. At first I was surprised, now I'm glad because I needed it!

If your not going to be doing ER, and just the 23-24 hr observation you should be ok with 4-6 weeks. I believe they move them over to there when they need to keep an eye but they aren't acutely ill. On nights it shouldn't be too bad because most of these patients are pretty stable otherwise, and other than the paperwork and a few pills they will sleep for part of the night. Until that chest painer does turn out to be a NSTEMI....

I would just see how it goes. :)

I'm a new grad working in PCU and eventually cross training in PICU. I was told that 6-8 weeks was the norm for PCU but I could have more if I needed it. The new grad PICU nurses get 6 months of training. I have only been on orientation for 3 weeks and have already learned so much! I still wish my orientation was 12 weeks though :(

heck! I was a new grad in May 2012 and I received a grand total of 12 shifts ER training at my hospital! 6 day shift and 6 night shifts! I live in a rural area, about 11,000 residents in our vary large county, and the closest level 2 trauma center in 90 miles away. We often treat and ship. We do not have Paramedics only EMTs on our ambulance service so RNs go on the transfers as well.

I have been an RN for 3 yrs, with 3yrs of home care experience and about 30 shifts of ER experience before I was hired at another hospital for a .5 ER position. I am just now finishing up with my preceptor. I believe we had about 20 shifts of precepting. I do not feel ready, but there are always other nurses around to ask, and I do know when to ask questions. I still am terrible at IV's and reading EKG's. I got ACLS, TNCC and PALS, but have not experienced most things except in theory. In short, I have alot to learn!

hey, i am currently doing medsurg and I can't do this anymore; can't stand doing butt wiping and nasty stuff which I did not expect to do as a baccalaureate graduate (same way for ADN nurses; they are equally great as BSN). I am burnt out of nursing and got an opportunity at an Observation unit, where I expect less butt wiping and pca work. Does this sound like an Observation unit?

can't stand doing butt wiping and nasty stuff which I did not expect to do as a baccalaureate graduate

Why did you think a BSN would get you out of that??

Why did you think a BSN would get you out of that??

I think the old mindset was BSN was not bedside nursing. But now all the big hospitals are requiring BSN. Maybe msn get out of booty wiping.

not necessarily just BSN, don't matter if ADN. I think nurses in general now have very high standards for education and science, yet remaining the part of "wiping butt" as our job is very inconsistent with requirements they put on us for the educational rigor. I don't like that inconsistency; "hey we are jacking up the study requirements and demand you to be smarter than ever... but you still going to wipe butt". that doesn't make a darn sense to me. our degree is like engineering, teaching, science, math, etc; yet they don't wipe butt!!

Specializes in Emergency.

Awesome, thread hijack on an ER thread to complain about butt wiping on med-surg.

Now back to orientation. Ours is 3 months for new grads.

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