I'm currently a nursing student doing a one year accelerated program to get my BSN, about one month in. I'm experiencing some doubts about my decision to go into this field and I'm hoping that some nurses out in the field can give me some insight.
I've always loved medicine and known that I wanted to work as a part of it. I love helping people and genuinely want to care for people who need it most. I love the material that I'm learning in class and I like that nursing is a stable job that pays well, gives good benefits and has options for movement and growth within in.
However, I keep hearing my professors talk about insane staffing ratios in hospitals, as high as 12 patients to one nurse. I hear about nurses being stretched so thin on their shifts and worked to the point of total exhaustion. I'm not afraid of hard work, I do want to work hard especially for something that I feel really makes a difference in someone's life, but I am concerned that I am idealizing the career and that its not how I picture it in reality. I've read more online and some nurses sound totally miserable and stresssed from being overworked and are simply expected to do too much. Now I am afraid that maybe I'm not making the right decision in my career path. I know some nurses really love their jobs which gives me hope.
maybe you can give me some insight into what working as a nurse day in and day out is like? My clinicals won't give me the real picture as we'll only be assigned to 1-3 patients for only 8 hour shifts.
edit: I have worked in a hospital and nursing home as an intern medical scribe and as a medical secretary for a year.
If you want to know what nursing is like, spend some time perusing the years and years worth of threads and posts on this website. There is a wealth of experience posted here even when you subtract the obvious 'less than helpful'.
Just remember it is fun and even therapeutic to anonymously complain here about your job, co-workers, boss, patients, etc. But is just venting, you get it off your chest then go back to work the next day in a better frame of mind. Or get some good advice about how to solve the "problem".
12:1 in acute care? I highly doubt that. Are you worked to the point of exhaustion? Yes. It's not easy.
I worked a travel contract in Kansas in 1998, and we had 12 or 13 busy acute patients per RN. The CNA's were gone by 23:00. I know for a fact that other hospitals staffed the same. I was tired!
I've worked a variety of positions as an RN, and most of those had me dreading to go towork every day. I'm currently a school nurse with over 3,000 students and 300 staff and I wouldn't trade it for anything except lottery winnings, and even then, I'd hate to walk away from my kids!
I worked as a CNA in a nursing home for 4 years before becoming a nurse. I loved it and excelled at it. I was everyone's "favorite" CNA. I just knew I would be a great nurse too! After the first year of my nursing program, I took the state boards to become an LPN. I continued working at the same nursing home and had a very rude awakening! I was extremely slow and lacked confidence. I didn't have time to really talk to or connect with any of my residents anymore. I felt like nothing more than a pill pusher. I felt like I went from being the best CNA to the worst nurse overnight. I dreaded going to work so much that I had panic attacks daily. I questioned my decision to go to nursing school and worried that I was going into debt for no reason. I thought seriously about quitting nursing school many times. I cried a lot. I stuck with it though. I got faster at passing meds. I got better at time management. I started to become better at my job, and I even started to enjoy it a little. After becoming an RN I got into the PACU at a level one trauma center that was the only hospital I ever applied at. At the time I wasn't sure where exactly in the hospital I wanted to work, but I applied for every available position for months. When I finally got the call for PACU I was skeptical. I told myself if I didn't like it I could always transfer to a different floor. The first year was extremely difficult. I had so much to learn that they don't teach in nursing school. Most of all I had to learn to trust myself and my instincts. I have been in the Recovery Room for four years now, and I absolutely love it! Doctors and CRNAs tell me all the time that I am a great nurse and they are happy when I get one of their patients. I feel like I have truly found my calling. I look forward to going to work now. We have a strict 1:2 nurse to patient ratio (1:1 if the patient is vented). The hardest part is seeing all of the pain. The best part is that you feel like you actually accomplished something at the end of the day. You get a patient that may be unstable and in a great deal of pain. Then you get to ease their pain. Once they are stable you get to send them on their way to continue healing. It really gives you a sense of closure. At the nursing home I always felt like I should have done more. There was always an incomplete task to pass onto the next shift. Sometimes it would still be waiting when I came back the next day. I hated it. One of the greatest things about nursing is the fact that there are so many different areas of specialty. If you hate one thing, you can always try something else. Hopefully you will be as fortunate as I was and find something you love! My advice is to stick with it. Becoming a nurse is without a doubt the best thing I have ever done!
There are plenty of hospitals that have a 1:8 ratio on their med-surg floors. Every ICU I've worked in has had a 1:3 ratio, and I worked in one ICU where I was required to take 4 patients. It seems that every facility is different. Right now I am required to take 3 patients in ICU. I can't imagine only having one vented patient!
It depends on what you like. I did adult post surgical for 3 years - I liked it but it was heavy. I liked the acuity of the floor but we had very little autonomy. I switched to NICU and I feel I have found my true passion, I love my job. It's very different. I find the team respects the nurses opinion more and the entire team works together for the patient, but I am able to do way less skills than on the floor...in the NICU they have certain nurses who are trained for certain skills and only they can do them...so I find that a little limiting. But every place is going to have its pros and cons....the beauty of nursing is that there is something out there for everyone.
I think in our ICU they take 2 or 3 patients regardless if they are vented or not. If vented patients have an ICU bed they don't even come to PACU. In general, the vented patients we get are usually traumas or being upgraded because they're unstable. They are usually in PACU waiting for a bed. Occasionally we get someone that's just not ready to be extubated yet. We give them a little more time and eventually extubate in PACU. Vented patients are not all that common. We usually only get one or two a week. We are fortunate to have enough staff to allow a 1:1 ratio with vented patients. Sometimes we only have 1 stable patient as well just because they are coming out of OR slowly. We usually only keep a patient in PACU for 45 minutes to an hour as long as they are stable and have a bed.
Specializes in orthopedic/trauma, Informatics, diabetes.
They certainly do not prepare you in school for what nursing really is and I think that is part of the problem. I love being a nurse. I was in my late 40s when I became a nurse. I know that I cannot spend the rest of my career on the floor, so I am getting my MSN in Informatics. I am trying to find a way to be a liaison between the floor nurses and EPIC people.
Love orthopedics. We have decent ratios (4-5 on an intermediate floor). I agree with many of the others that it is a good idea to work the floor and learn, then see what else interests you. There are SO many things you can do in nursing.
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brownbook
3,413 Posts
Just remember it is fun and even therapeutic to anonymously complain here about your job, co-workers, boss, patients, etc. But is just venting, you get it off your chest then go back to work the next day in a better frame of mind. Or get some good advice about how to solve the "problem".