First Job in Hospice?

Hellllllo Nurse, BSN, RN · Jan 2, 2004

The hospice where I worked required their nurses to have a couple of years experience, but every place is different.

Mazzi · Jan 2, 2004

Do yourself a favor a get some hospital experience first. The hospice I work for employed a nurse with ECF management experience only. She did not know/remember from school how to do IV's, pumps, dressing changes, many nursing procedues. So guess who had to go do things to help her?? When you have yourself a busy day, you become resentful to have to do her work. There is nothing better than experience. Then you can go any where. Good luck to you.

aimeee, BSN, RN · Jan 2, 2004

Melly, while some organizations may hire new grads, I think you will find the lion's share require at least a year in some type of acute or skilled care. Without it you just don't have the knowledge base to comfortably handle all the things that come up on home visits. Its not just the technical stuff that Mazzi mentions, its the solid assessment skills and judgment that develop with experience and exposure.

florry · Jan 6, 2004

Hello!

Ireally understand your wish or maybe the wish to be safer inside and uotside (psychomotoric skills/emotilonell skills) to handle critical sick persons, whith SEVERE pain, pain you might never have seen before. I have nearly 4 clinical years with sarcoma -patiens; from 2years to 100. I had my spec. in geriatric nursing and did my first 7 years as a RN at a hospital with acute patiens. For 10 years I have been a nurse-ducator, but went back to clinical nursing.

I am SURE you ar prepeared emotilonally, the whole life is learning. I am sure you are a very good nurse. For you yourself I want to give you this advice; Think about BEnner: from novice to expert; and I am sure you ar expert in something allready! But the HOSPICE NURSING is so complex: its everything from comunication- witch is VERRY HARD SOMETIMES - handeling PAIN YOU NEVER HAD SEEN BEFORE!- AND OF COURSE MUCH MORE.

tHEREFOR: Take some of the advice I have seen here, learn more about common doses of painkillers, other medication, different ways to adm. the medic. in ,sideeffect, the different pumps, machines and so on.

I am VERY GLAD I put it that way; Generel hospital first, I also have learned to handle my own sadness when people passed away, and reflect over it, in job together with my collegies and do som debrefing before I go home. Love from Florry:)

Spiritwalker · Jan 7, 2004

The fact that your heart whispers "hospice" to you will eventually take you there...but I would recommend getting some clinical experience first. I can tell you that my "hospice heart" was well utilized during my Med/Surg learning curve. There was the 21 year old young woman who went in for an appendectomy...only for them to discover metastasized ovarian cancer...and my AIDS patients...and on and on......you'll get there...angels walk with you!

jerseyRN · Jan 7, 2004

Sure it's good to have experience, but there's never only one right way. Go for it! But find a hospice (preferably a nonprofit) who appreciates you... and will give you as long an orientation as you need.

Two other ideas:

1.) start off in an inpatient hospice unit, to get the experience in a setting where there's people around to support and mentor you.

2.) work as a hospice home health aide. You will see everything and learn a lot, not to mention provide a lot of comfort to the people in your care. (You won't earn much money, but you won't as a hospice nurse, either.)

Follow your heart! And good luck

nursenetkin · Jan 12, 2004

Hello,

I wanted to encourage you to go for it as a hospice nurse if you have ANY experience at all that will make it easier... I graduated in May and went to work immediately at an inpatient hopsice facility. My orientation was really tough as it consisted of giving me more and more patients each week, until by week six I was carrying the same load as the experienced nurses.

However, I had done beravement counseling in the past, so the psycho/social work was not overwhelming. The other nurses were great support and we really team up to get the work done. It is an incredibly difficult job to learn without other nursing experience, but it can be done.

You will learn so much, every day, and each day will offer you amazing experiences.

Get yourself some special books to delve deeper into the specialty:

I reccomend Palliative Care Nursing - Quality Care to the End of Life edited by Matzo & Sherman as well as

Notes on Symptom Control In Hopsice and Palliative Care by Peter Kaye

these 2 have been most helpful to me.

Good Luck and God Bless

Deb

florry · Jan 17, 2004

Hello again!

I wrote to you earlier about having experience and so on. But I agree with the answers here; encouricing you to follow your hart!!

I have allways followed my own rule:

THE DAY I LOSE MY ABILITY TO TO FEEL VULNERABLE,- I WILL LOSE THE ABILITY TO BE A GOOD NURSE.

A GOOD NURSE KNOWS HOW TO BALANCE INTIMACY AND DISTANCE IN PERFORMING HER PROFESSION.

Follow your heart, but besure that you have a good network and a superwiser. Nursing is like life: a proscess: learning somthing new everyday, and allow your self to feel both glad and sad! Whatever you decide to do!

Hugs from Florry:kiss

jerseyRN · Jan 17, 2004

What is end-of-life care like in Norway? In the U.S., 80% of people die in hospitals or institutions... is it the same where you are?

florry · Jan 17, 2004

Yes, its excactly the same persent! But when I said hospital: I mean all kind of intstution: hospital, nusing home, the few hospice we have (approx. 5). The rest 20 % is dying at home- naturally- or with help from homecare-nursing team.

jerseyRN · Jan 17, 2004

Hi again, Florry, thanks for your response. Do you work in hospice?

Guess I had a mistaken impression... I thought the Scandinavian countries were more progressive than us in this regard. Sounds like we're not the only country that has a long way to go when it comes to palliative care.