How different is Acute Burn Unit for regular Med/Surg floor?

allnurses Guide · Jun 9, 2008

Sunshine, although there will be some similarities med/surg and burns are like Chalk and Cheese.

Burns is all about infection prevention, fluid resuscitation, huge dressings which sometimes require anaesthetic to do, nutrician, and lots and lots of psychological support.

I found that burns nursing let me use every aspect of nursing I had ever learnt and enjoyed every minute

sunshine9403 · Jun 9, 2008

with only a year of med/surg and doing travel nursing with only 1 day to orient to the floor how hard would it be to ajust to the dressing and pts ect? While doing med/surg I have been in the float pool to ICU, Womens Care, and Rehabilitation.

allnurses Guide · Jun 9, 2008

ICU will stand you in good stead, the hardest thing I found was the dressing and managing pain is always a challenge, also things like nutrition is vital, we used to NG tube every burn pateint over a certain percentage.

By the time I finished I could make a whole outfit out of cotton wool roll, the area I worked in was an emergency admissions so we saw the very worst. The burns ward was a good steady pace, we had a theatre attached that we took patients to for dressings and although we went with out patients to the theatre there were plenty of theatre staff to support with the dressings.

It will depend on how your unit is set out and the support structure there

It is an excellent experience, and I loved it.

tonyf · May 26, 2012

Hello thinking of traveling with 1 year med/surg experience out of nursing school to an 16 bed acute care burn unit in Winston-Salem, NC for a 13 week travel nurse assignment. How different would it be?

sorry, no offense intended, but working on a 16 bed burn unit after 1 yr med/ surg experience would concern me about the facility if they accepted you and the agency if they promoted you for the contract. Burn care is so different you could easily use a 13 wk orientation much less being expected to hit the floor running. if you get it good luck.

nathanfl · May 27, 2012

hey, i work on an acute burn floor in UNC chapel hill and it is fantastic, we are hiring and the training is great, not too far from Winston-Salem.