How to become Emergency/Trauma RN in BC??

akardan · Jan 21, 2011

MishaSteph

I graduated last year and have been working as an emergency nurse since 3rd year of nursing school. I might able to give you an idea about where to start. There courses generally courses provided by BCIT and Mount Royal College in Calgary on specialty emergency nursing. These are obviously theory and clinical courses and you need to go through the clinical once you're done with the theory part. So when apply for the courses make sure the possibility of doing the clinical in your area if you think you won't able to attend the clinical in other cities. I personally took the BCIT courses but I heard a lot of good on Mount Royal as well.

You usually start with EKG reading and interpretation on first part and then move to theories on emergency nursing. And then depending on school, you might start your clinical.

I know in BCIT if you're already in emergency setting and working, you'll get credits for that as part of your clinical as well.

I recommend applying both for school and a position. In emergency setting as you know, you encounter pretty much everything so you better off be in the environment and see what's actually happening while you're taking the courses. You usually won't be signed to monitored beds until you feel comfortable but it's a huge huge help once you're there working with other expert nurses and see what actually happening.

Hope this helps and good luck.

michupat · Jan 22, 2011

might I also recommend taking the TNCC (trauma nursing core course) and if applicable ENPC (basically TNCC for paeds). These are both required in addition to ACLS and PALS where I am working. Good Luck! :rolleyes:

Vanillanut, DNP, RN, APRN · Jan 23, 2011

I'm an Emerg RN in the lower mainland.

I think you should first approach the ER manager at your hospital and get some experience in the emerg environment first, as a med-surg ER RN. You will get the feel for how an ED works, be assigned less sick patients then ER trained RN's, and it's a good starting point.

After a bit of experience- a yr give or take- you can elect to take emerg courses. If you do not want to do this through your employer, your choices are limited: Quit your job/take an extended leave and go to school out of your own pocket, or hope your job is understanding. Basically if you don't go through your hospital's sponsorship program, it will raise an eyebrow of suspicion in terms of your commitment to that hospital long-term as most places require 1 yr post graduation commitment to work at their hosp (or at one of the authority's hosps).

Courses like TNCC, ENPC etc are all great, but thats for much later on down the line when you actually get your feet wet- probably after you've got your ER med-surg experience, after you get your specialty, and then some more experience after that.