General Surgical Unit or Telemetry Unit?

pmabraham, BSN, RN · Jun 14, 2017

While mileage may vary based on the employer, I really appreciate starting on a cardiac telemetry floor. I feel that the experience I get every shift is preparing a great foundation for future endeavors.

Redhead,RN, BSN · Jun 27, 2017

I also started on a cardiac Tele floor. Great general experience without the boredom of med/surg. Despite popular belief, you do not always need to start on med/surg. If anything (and I've worked both) med/surg can burn you out quicker with the larger patient load.

AJJKRN · Jun 27, 2017

Funny how at my place of work the cardiac tele floors are general Med-Surg floors with a cardiac patient population twist but then again all of our fooors have tele monitoring. Really depends on what the OP is drawn to. A cardiac tele floor is boring for me. Give me the MVA's, GSW's, whipples and other crazy ABD general surgeries, the fresh trach's, and neck disections, crazy wounds, need I go on. All of our floors can do cardizem, amio, nitro, etc gtts (to a certain dosing parameter before being ICU/Stepdown status) so it really depends on the hospital and the floor's patient population.

Workitinurfava, BSN, RN · Jun 28, 2017

Go for surgery. Many of the surgery nurses I would run into in the hospital always said they felt sorry for the cardiac tele nurses. It is like the ICU but with too many sick patients to safely look after. You can go more places with the surgery experience. You can get a job almost anywhere.

Purple_roses · Jun 29, 2017

Go for surgery. Many of the surgery nurses I would run into in the hospital always said they felt sorry for the cardiac tele nurses. It is like the ICU but with too many sick patients to safely look after. You can go more places with the surgery experience. You can get a job almost anywhere.

I think that depends on what kind of tele floor it is. For instance, my cardiac tele floor is not considered a step down unit. My patient load during the day is usually 4 and at night is 5 (6 at most). What makes it hectic is that patients are constantly being discharged and admitted. And I actually don't believe that you can go more places with med/surg experience as opposed to cardiac telemetry.

lolita17 · Nov 27, 2017

Hi!
I got offers in both General Surgery Unit and Telemetry Unit.
The General Surgery Unit is at UCLA while the Telemetry Unit is in Seattle.
I was attracted to the telemetry unit because I had a rotation on cardiac step down unit which I loved and I knew I wanted to be back on a cardiac type floor someday.
The offer at UCLA may not be the floor I want to start on because I don't have any experience rotating on that floor, but maybe I will be able to move to another unit within a year or two while getting that nurse year experience!
Thoughts on where I should start?

Which unit did you end up choosing? I have an offer from the telemetry floor at VM in Seattle and would love any insight if that's the unit you chose