How far are your clinicals?

maire, ASN, RN · Jan 16, 2003

Where you go for ours depends on what class you are in (days, evenings, clinicals on Thursday day, clinicals on Thursday eve, etc). The one I got is a good 45 minute drive away from my house, but a friend of mine who has her clinical on a different day than I do has hers at a hospital 25-30 minutes away. Just the luck of the draw I guess.

I didn't hear anything about doing a night-before visit, but then I just had my orientation yesterday so who knows what else they are going to spring on us before this is over! :)

nessa1982 · Jan 16, 2003

Our clinicals arent too far from school. One is about 2 miles away and the others are about 25-35 minutes away. Thing is I live 40 miles from school (no traffic yeah!). But some of the clincials have some massive traffic on the way to them. Ah the dreaded Los Angeles morning traffic! (eeew, take your car get on the freeway and park!)

Joh · Jan 20, 2003

Hi, I'm Joh from Australia, our placements can be up to over 10hours away,,, so we usually have to stay in nursing quarters. There are 2 local hospitals, but with so many students we all are expected to go away for at least 1 out of 3 placements, sometimes up to 2 weeks. This year (my final), I am expected to be out of town for 4 weeks...with 3 children and a husband who works out of town,, it gets quite tricky.. must be what they call "dedication"..

FullMoonMadness · Jan 20, 2003

my school uses 3 different hospitals.some of the students have to drive 50 miles one way.luckily,i am assisgned not only to the hospital closest to my house,i also work there and know the layout.It is going to be weird showing up to my unit for clinicals as a student instead of an lpn who works there.

soogirl · Jun 3, 2004

We had to drive 1.75 hours to get to our ICU clinical (and cross a nurses' picket line!). We drove Mon am, had clinical til 1900, stayed at a hotel, clinical from 7 till 1400, drove back home for 1500 class. We did this for 5 weeks - fortunately the hospital paid for our motel (they wanted to hire us!) but we paid gas and food.

For mental health ... 4.5 hour drive one way - 2 night stay - we paid for gas, hotel, food - we did this for 3 weekends.

manna, BSN, RN · Jun 3, 2004

My clinicals will be anywhere from 30 to 120 miles away from where I live (that's one way!), depending on rotation. I'm terrified at the thought, but don't really have any choice in the matter. My school itself is about 60 miles from home.

purplemania, BSN, RN · Jun 3, 2004

we had to go the night before to get pt. info. If your school does not have a template you might develop your own that will ask the pertinent data you need (age, gender, Primary/secondary DX, meds, lab values, etc). Then copy the blank template and use it to gather the info. You can go home then to do any research on meds, procedures, etc. Just a thought. The instructor probably wants to be sure you have a clue as to what is going on with your patient.

Truly_Blessed · Jun 4, 2004

hmmm, this post is old, but I will answer anyway. I am not sure about all of the clinical sites, but we were made aware of one that we had at a mental health facility. That clinical will be 65 miles one way. I will already have to drive out of town for school, so no biggie.

RedSox33RN · Jun 4, 2004

Our clinicals could be within an hour's drive of the school. Technically for me it could be 2 hours, since I have an hour's drive anyway to school. But they said they give that consideration, so hopefully I won't end up with a 2 hour drive.

mitchsmom · Jun 4, 2004

I'm pretty sure all of ours are with 15-30mins. for locals, but I live 100 miles away so it will always be far for me. I will be leaving home BY 4:30 to get to clinicals by 6:45am. And that is assuming there isn't any disaster somewhere on the road in between. There aren't any programs any closer.

FutureNurse2005 · Jun 4, 2004

i'm hoping that my site for the first 2 years will be the local hospital 5 minutes away (and the local LTC). For years 3 and 4 I hope to be at a special hospital downtown (about an hours drive). It will all depend on how much I like oncology!

suzy253, RN · Jun 5, 2004

Everything's close in Rhode Island!