For experienced nurses, can you honestly encourage anyone to enter nursing?

askater11 · Feb 21, 2002

I tell people about the profession...the positives and negatives...it's up to them to decide. I also recommend volunteering in a hospital.

micro, RN · Feb 24, 2002

no, but I would tell them how it really is!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! if you care about people and truly mean that.....then it isn't a bad way to make a $$$$$$$$$ :roll :roll :roll :imbar

beckymcrn · Mar 9, 2002

Yes, I can recommend people join our field. I love what I do. Ok I do have days when I want to scream and run out the door. But doesn't everyone everywhere? I can honestly say when my day is over no matter how hectic I have helped someone, even if they do not appriciate it. I think we should really focus on why we became nurses and do what we have to do. Afterall the doctor is not going to do it!!!

micro, RN · Mar 9, 2002

I can't picture anything diff.........cause I am not geared to it.............

MQ Edna · Mar 10, 2002

If someone felt that nursing was the only thing in the world he/she wanted to do...that there was nothing else as a career option, then I guess I wouldn't try to talk him/her out of it. However, I would want that person to know all the pros and cons...not just the "warm fuzzies."

micro, RN · Mar 10, 2002

for sure.......it is just not passing tylenols.......

MassLPN · Mar 11, 2002

I can't say that I go out of my way to suggest nursing as a field for anyone to go into. If someone asks my opinion, I give them a very candid account of my nursing career, and let them take it from there. There's a lot to consider, as we all know, and these days more than in the past, it takes a very special and determined person to make it in nursing.

micro, RN · Mar 12, 2002

Yes it does!!!!!!!!!!!

babs_rn · Mar 21, 2002

YES

1996-1998. Nursing layoffs. Impossible to get a hospital job. Wound up working at McD's for minimum wage. I was lucky to get even that job because I was "overqualified" for everything else...they were just desperate. Then I went to work at a small hotel (part of a national well-known chain) that employed 3!! RNs - me as night audit manager, one as head of housekeeping, and one to run the breakfast room. In this climate you can't be assured of always having a job. With the shortage on, sure...but it will cycle back out. I always used to believe that jobs would always be out there...but they weren't. Now I've lost that security.

I would only recommend nursing to someone who is young and does not intend to have a family if they want to do hospital nursing; or to someone who has a spouse who can financially support them if they need normal working hours. That's it. It's just not fair to family (especially the kids) to have a mom or dad who is either working or sleeping all the time.

Those 12 hour shifts are nice if you have enough days off in between - but if you do, then you're working a bunch in a row and there is no existence outside of work on those days, and it usually takes a couple of days to recover and catch up on all the stuff that needs to be taken care of outside of work. So you maybe get a day or two to enjoy before you're back at it.

babs

scrappy · Mar 24, 2002

NO:cool:

micro, RN · Mar 24, 2002

scrappy...........gotta love your simplicity.......and truth!!!!!!!!!!!!!

mjamesRN · Mar 24, 2002

the patients are wonderful...real humanity as never seen in any other profession....the corporate part of it stinks...