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Specializes in Pediatric Cardiology.

I am graduating in a few weeks and I am very interested in pediatrics. Everyone that I talk to says I should get adult med-surg experience first. I guess I am just trying to get some feedback. I guess I just don't get the point, if pedi is what I want to do why do I need adult experience?

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I had the same question. I've heard to go for peds 1st then once those options are spent then try med-surg. I also recently heard that peds home care might be a good option for someone w/our interests

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Specializes in Pediatrics.

I heard that as I came closer to graduating nursing school, however, I went with what I enjoyed the most: working with children. I'm on a general med-surg pediatric floor for the past year and a half and it has been a wonderful experience. I've learned so much about disease process and about nursing care in general. Either way it is an experience in nursing and any experience is better than no experience. If you love working with kids, then go into pediatrics. Why spend the first time working as an RN in a field that you are not that interested in?

I'm going for my masters in august to be a FNP. The only issue i ran into was that I've only worked in Peds, but luckily I had an awesome comprehensive in Adult Neuro as well as adult rotations on med-surg floors. Looking back, I would not have done ANYTHING differently. Do Peds first. It's so rewarding and you'll be happy doing what youre doing!

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Specializes in Pediatric.

I was told the same thing but I loved kids so much that I just went for it. I worked in community/home care with a 13 year old and loved every bit of it. now i work at the childrens hospital in Vancouver, BC. and this is even more amazing. I'm so glad I followed my patient, I never want to return to adult care. This is where I'm meant to be. If you think you know your passion, just go for it.

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Specializes in pediatrics, public health.

I agree with the others who say to go straight into peds if you can. I did, and most of the other nurses I worked with did -- some of these nurses have been peds nurses their entire 20 to 30+ year careers. The only downside to going straight to peds would be if you think you might want to work with adults at some point later in your career -- but if you know that peds is where your heart is, then go for it!

I spent the first 1.5 years of my nursing career doing bedside nursing in a peds hospital, and am now transitioning to a public health position where I will be working with infants and toddlers in the foster care system. I don't feel limited in my career choices by having gone straight into peds -- I want to continue working with kids for my whole career, so my time as a bedside pediatric nurse is, I believe, the best possible start for the rest of my career.

Good luck!

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I know everyone says Med-surg is where you should start but pediatrics and psych are the only two where I don't see that as necessary. Adult disease aren't the same as child diseases so the only thing you would really benefit from is managing patients and since med-surg is usually high nurse-patient ratio I don't get how it works.

When I graduate I want to do either Maternity or Peds, I can understand why they would say do med-surg for Maternity but for peds, it just doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense.

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Specializes in pediatrics, public health.

I know lots of people who went straight into maternity and who are doing just fine. Honestly, I don't understand why anyone sees adult med-surg as a prerequisite for anything other than adult med-surg. Or maybe for ICU -- I can see how working with the less acute patients on a med-surg floor first might be a good thing before you move on to sicker patients. But then, I also know people who went straight to ICU and are doing just fine with that too.

I think that, no matter what specialty you start in, you'll need some amount of training to switch to another. That's true whether you start in med-surg and switch to maternity, or vice versa. Some skills may carry over from one area to another -- like IV starts and blood draws, as well as some basic time management skills -- but each area also has skills and diagnoses that you'll only be dealing with in that area.

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It may actually be a bad idea to start in adult med/surg because then you will be competing against nurses with peds experience for a pedi position. I went into peds right after graduation and it was definetly the best decision. :-)

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Specializes in Med/Surg, Pediatrics.

What about those of us who were not lucky enough to get a Peds position right out of school? I could not find an open position anywhere and am now working Med-Surg at a big hospital. Will this experience be beneficial if I eventually want to go into Peds?

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Specializes in NICU, PICU, PCVICU and peds oncology.

No learning is ever wasted. New grads start in peds with no real peds experience... or much real nursing experience period. Just think of all the things med-surg has to teach you... prioritization, organization, time management, assessments, interpersonal communications... all things that are important to peds too. So of course your med-surg experience will be beneficial.

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I always hear start off in Med-surg and at first it use to discourage me, because I always wanted to work in OB or PEds. I am so glad you all are giving great advise and encouraging words coming from my desired specialties.

:yelclap: Brit.

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