Inquiry about doing wound care as a new grad nurse

[ilovenai95]

Hi guys,

Since I am very interested in doing wound care, I wonder if you guys do not mind answering some of the questions related to this specialty?

1. Do I need to be certified in order to do wound care as a registered nurse?

2. Do I need at least 1-2 year of experience in order to be eligible to take the certification exam?

3. If I only want to work in wound care, do I really need to take the full scope of wound, ostomy, and continence care? or just a single scope of wound care is sufficient enough?

Look forward to hearing your answers soon.

Thank you so much!

[CalicoKitty, BSN, MSN, RN]

General wound care is a part of a registered nurse's duties. For staff nurses, it is either following the written wound care orders or else following a flowsheet about what dressings/topicals to use for various situations.

You should have some wound care experience before actually becoming a wound care nurse. There are 2 ways to become a certified wound care nurse, one is education and clinical experience (50 hours) then exam, this is through the Wound, Ostomy & Continence Nurses society to become a CWCN. The other is an exam you can qualify for after 3 years of wound care experience for a CWS.

Many places (hospitals) would hire only CWOCNs - wound, ostomy & continence. So, it may be beneficial to get all 3 certifications.

[michksmith14, MSN, RN]

On ‎4‎/‎5‎/‎2019 at 11:27 AM, ilovenai95 said:

1. Do I need to be certified in order to do wound care as a registered nurse? As Calico said, you do not need to be certified in order to perform wound care. Any nurse can do this. If you feel uncomfortable performing a certain dressing, you could as your resource RN or even a wound nurse to assist and teach you... especially for the more difficult dressings like VACs.

2. Do I need at least 1-2 year of experience in order to be eligible to take the certification exam? It is helpful to have some experience before getting certified. I began the education/clinicals towards cert after about 1 yr as a RN. To be certified by the "gold standard" WOCNCB, you must have a BSN. If you do not have a BSN, there are other certifying boards like the WCC you can go through.

3. If I only want to work in wound care, do I really need to take the full scope of wound, ostomy, and continence care? or just a single scope of wound care is sufficient enough? Some wound care positions don't require all 3 but most of them prefer it. It makes you more marketable and desirable to have all 3, or at the very least Wound and Ostomy certs!

Best of luck! -Michelle