ICU interview questions?

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Hi all,

I have an interview for a SICU position next Thursday. I get pretty anxious with interviews. Are there any common interview questions that I can go ahead and mentally prepare for? Any questions or scenarios that are used to throw a new grad off? I am working in a small 10 bed ICU as a student tech and doing my practicum in a Level 1 trauma center. How much should I talk these up?

Thanks for the advice.

Zram44

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Specializes in SICU.

From what I remember, it was mostly just questions about what you would do next. They're certainly not expecting you to know specifically what to do (that's what they teach you in orientation). They want to know basics. They want to know if you would draw labs, when you would ask for input from the doc or other nurses, what generic intervention could possibly happen. For example, your patient has a change in LOC, a head CT may be warranted, but also, what meds have they gotten, what's their blood sugar? What are the basic signs of cardiac tamponade? Just stuff like that. They aren't going to expect you to know some minute detail about some crazy disease that you may see once in your entire career. They just want to make sure that you have the ability to start thinking critically (which not everyone can).

So relax! Good luck on your interview.

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Hi Guys,

I have two SICU internship interviews scheduled for the next week and I was wondering if anyone could recommend what questions I should ask the managers. I already have a couple of questions lined up:

1) pt to nurse ratio

2) how are the assingments made (acuity vs proximity, and who makes the assingments)

3) what happens if there's a call in or the unit is short staffed?

4) what types of anxillary personel are available on the unit? What are they responsibilities?

5) what type of educational resources are available for new nurses?

6)the length of orientation and possibility of extending it if there is a need

7) have you ever had an orientee that you had to ask to leave, why and how this situation was handled.

Thanks for all your help in advance.

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I interviewed for a SICU position about a month and a half ago and the manager for ICU was the first one to interview me. She pretty asked me why I choose SICU and told me if I knew how hard the job was going to be. Then one of the staff from SICU interviewed me and also asked why I picked SICU. They really didn't drill me on anything specific. I just acted like myself told them why I wanted to do SICU and luckily they liked me and gave me the job.

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Hi Guys,

I have two SICU internship interviews scheduled for the next week and I was wondering if anyone could recommend what questions I should ask the managers. I already have a couple of questions lined up:

1) pt to nurse ratio

2) how are the assingments made (acuity vs proximity, and who makes the assingments)

3) what happens if there's a call in or the unit is short staffed?

4) what types of anxillary personel are available on the unit? What are they responsibilities?

5) what type of educational resources are available for new nurses?

6)the length of orientation and possibility of extending it if there is a need

7) have you ever had an orientee that you had to ask to leave, why and how this situation was handled.

Thanks for all your help in advance.

Some other questions you could ask are: what are the managers management style and what do they their interns to accomplish and how fast.

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