How Can You Be A Nurse With No Clinical Background?

PMFB-RN, RN · Dec 9, 2012

I will be twenty-three going on twenty-four so that puts me two years behind.

*** Your not behind anything. I urge you to relax a little about this time line. I would hate to see you have a lot of stress about it. I am aquanted with a young nurse (I was her ICU night shift preceptor) who will be graduating from CRNA school in August 2013 at the age of 24 (actually the 2nd 24 year old advanced practice nurse I have known) after becoming an RN at age 18. I know plenty of others who did grad school at an older age with a family and things worked out just fine.

ThePrincessBride, MSN, RN, NP · Dec 10, 2012

When you're mumblemumble years old, like me, and probably even sooner, those two years in your twenties will shrink into the insignificance they deserve. Move on and try not to think about it so much.

I mean, in terms of fertility years, two years can be the difference between having that fourth kid or not (I want mine spaced out). If I were a guy with an unlimited amount of baby making years, I wouldn't be so stressed over it.

But I guess it is all in perspective.

ThePrincessBride, MSN, RN, NP · Dec 10, 2012

*** Your not behind anything. I urge you to relax a little about this time line. I would hate to see you have a lot of stress about it. I am aquanted with a young nurse (I was her ICU night shift preceptor) who will be graduating from CRNA school in August 2013 at the age of 24 (actually the 2nd 24 year old advanced practice nurse I have known) after becoming an RN at age 18. I know plenty of others who did grad school at an older age with a family and things worked out just fine.

That is impressive!

It is definitely hard to not stress about it, especially when you go to a super intense and competitive nursing school where everyone and their mom wants to be a CRNA by 25 and you are almost 25 yourself.

But I just don't want to be in grad school, AND working AND raising a family, you know? Way too much. I congratulate those who can juggle all that at once, but I couldn't do it.

healthstar, BSN, RN · Dec 10, 2012

I know that bedside nursing, and many years of experience make a better nurse, however, this is not true for all nurses. You'll find nurses with less experience who know more, and those with many years of experience that know many tips and tricks but lack nursing knowledge.....I strongly believe that a nurse with years of bedside experience will have an easier time in grad school, and will most likely be a better nurse practitioner ( faster). However, a new grad nurse who goes straight for DNP, will have an easier time in grad school because the content is fresh, test wise. But will suffer in clinicals, and will probably not be familiar with many pt conditions. It will take longer for a new nurse to adapt to a DNP role. Everyone is different and every knows strengths and weaknesses, they have their reasons for pursuing DNP at different times. Think about an MD, he spends so many years in school, yes they might not be as good for the first couple of years but they learn everyday and one day they master it! Same goes for those nurses with zero bedside experience, who went straight to grad school. People succeed at different times. :)

PMFB-RN, RN · Dec 10, 2012

That is impressive!
It is definitely hard to not stress about it, especially when you go to a super intense and competitive nursing school where everyone and their mom wants to be a CRNA by 25 and you are almost 25 yourself.
But I just don't want to be in grad school, AND working AND raising a family, you know? Way too much. I congratulate those who can juggle all that at once, but I couldn't do it.

*** Ah well don't worry about it. No way more than a tiny few of them can accomplish that. The bottle neck will be getting their ICU experience and ICU nurse managers hate hiring grads who want to accept months of expensive training only to leave the unit for CRNA school as soon as they become usefull. I have even know nurse managers to conact nursing instructors and vist Facebook pages to potential new grad hires to find out if they plan on just useing the ICU. Besides if getting into CRNA schoo ASAP was hose students primary goal they would have gone to an ADN program. Fastest way I have seen of geting into CRNA school is through the community collge, not a University.

plumiegirl · Dec 12, 2012

Well I could not get a job after my ADN program and passing the NCLEX, recession in the early to mid 1990's, so I went and finished my BSN and PHN and spent 3 months interviewing for any nursing job and managed to get hired as a school nurse. The only bedside clinical experience was in my nursing school rotations. Ironically I work and service the severe handicap population which includes colostomy bag changes, trach suctioning, urinary catherters, g-tube feedings, etc. Ironically my hospital experienced peers complain that they are rusty and can't do these tasks anymore. Funny but I can, why is that? So I took the "harder" students and only I know how to do these things? Soo much for clinical experience. It is a matter of critical thinking skills, common sense, and a work ethic in my opinion. Try to have a wider view on this. Yes there are folks that would fail in these situations but there is always someone who can do it.

monkeybug · Dec 12, 2012

I talked about this with my friend who wants to go into law -- we got onto the topic because she wanted me to be her nurse consultant. Our teacher was telling us it's possible for someone to go into nursing, and with how the law is written, yeah, they can have little to no clinical experience if there's a good reason (I think the example she used was if they couldn't move/lift a certain amount, they couldn't be expected to pull up a patient...this conversation was a while ago) because the school had to be able to accomodate. Their options then would be to go into nurse consulting, be a nurse rep, or do telenursing.
That said, while I agree with you (it does bother me a little that some people are moving up the ranks with what seems like little to no experience), some people are really good managers and/or leaders. The person you described could've been delegating (as someone else said), or possibly just lazy, but it's not like he's representative of an entire group of people.
Regardless, at the end of the day, I'd rather someone who can actually manage people and lead them to something good rather than someone who has 30+ years experience, but can't get a group of people to cooperate.

Your friend should probably do some serious soul searching and research before heading to law school. It is increasingly hard for lawyers, even those with experience, to find jobs. I am a lawyer, although I have let my license lapse because it was too expensive to keep it up. I've been working as a nurse since about 6 months after I passed the Bar. I couldn't find a job anywhere as a lawyer, despite graduating with decent grades from one of the top 40 schools in the nation. But, to the bright eyed students applying to law school, my school represents me as being employed in their statistics! They tell recruits that they have a 98% employment rate, but I count towards that percentage because I am employed doing something, anything. And it's not just my state, it's nationwide. The New York Times just did some articles about it. Okay, off my soapbox.

Good Morning, Gil · Dec 12, 2012

Acute care experience is valuable, yes, that can't be denied. But, if someone states acute care just isn't their thing, and they enjoy clinics more, then that is still clinical experience, just of a different kind. If this person wants to manage in an acute care setting, then I do agree. It would be wise to have clinical experience in that setting, but 1 person you encounter that doesn't seem all that interested in nursing or learning nursing does not sum up the whole (that don't really care for acute care and would rather work in a clinic right out of nursing school). Every area of nursing is important, and while I work in acute care, I don't think acute care is superior to an outpatient setting. Those that work in the outpatient setting get more opportunity to educate the same people consistently, which is the foundation for preventative medicine.

hav2nurse · Dec 12, 2012

I graduated with my ADN nursing program in 2004 (my second career), my RN-BSN in 2008 and my MSN-CRA in 2012 so I don't have tons of bedside nursing experience. I always knew that I would eventually work in Oncology research, but felt that I should have some clinical experience. I threw myself into bedside nursing, worked registry so I could be comfortable working in any facility, and also did 3 years of travel nursing. Travel nurses are pretty much thrown onto a floor and expected to just start working. What I learned, from all the experience I jammed into 5 years, was that there are some really poorly trained nurses out there who I think should not be on the floor. It made me realize that good nurses are the nurses that want to be good. When they are not great at certain skills they find ways to learn and look to nurses who can help and they get better. Also, a lot of new nurses are entering the profession as their second career so they have the experience and maturity it takes to lead.

I have met nurses who have been on the floor for 10 years and they only know their floor, but lack any further advanced knowledge. The great thing about nursing is that you can work in a small community hospital, on the same floor for years or you can try many different things, or advance your education. Your experience or education level does not make you a good nurse, but rather your passion, care of patients, and skills. There are great nurse educators that would make terrible bedside nurses, and great bedside nurses that would make terrible nurse educators. Variety is the beauty of nursing. I love nursing and admire all my fellow nurses. Yes, there are some nurses out there that don't care and only want a pay check, but to make assumptions on a narrow group of people is dismissing all the great and wonderful nurses out there. As a professional group we should celebrate each others victories.

knightlycomic · Dec 12, 2012

Finding your path in nursing is one off the most difficult things to achieve as a nurse. People make good managers, (nurses flip a coin), I have seen great managers that have had lots of clinical experience and those who are terrible as managers and managers with little clinical nursing experience at all being great.

Great managers lead, empower and develop others to succeed. It is through the actions and talents of our teams and staff that that make managers succeed, we are by nature parasitic, success = success just as failure must = failure. There is the perception that managers push the company line most of the time and it is sad to say this is often true, I have seen this cause total collapse in teams and services. Managers are often the piggy in the middle.

Clinical experience in any form is important to managers and educators in the nursing profession it allows for a base of understanding and to others can be seen as paying dues to the profession of nursing.

Just my opinon........................

MochaRN424, ASN · Dec 12, 2012

While I was in nursing school I worked for the Dean of Nursing at a major hospital here. She worked at the bedside for only 1 year and left! Hmmm not to bad in my opinion!

RNtobeinSoCal · Dec 26, 2012

Don't judge those who don't have med-surg experience. About 50% of nurses work OUTSIDE hospitals. Also, please consider the fact that many nurses try and try and try but just haven't been able to get a job in a hospital! We take work where we can get it - I'm crushed I haven't been able to get into a hospital, but value the experience I am getting outside.

The nursing tree has sooooooo many branches, all beautiful leaves in their own right.