Last Semester Clinical Experience

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Hi everyone,

I'm just wondering what some of your last semester clinical experiences were like in BSN programs. Specifically, did you get to work one-on-one with a nurse? My specific college is no longer offering this to the majority of the students...and it was something that I was certainly looking forward to earlier in the program to gain that experience that I wouldn't be able to in a standard clinical group. I'm just in another standard clinical group with six students just weeks before graduating... it's sort of scary!

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Specializes in L&D, infusion, urology.

We had a senior preceptorship, where we had to spend 180 hours with a nurse on an assigned unit. You're there when that nurse is there (unless you have other clinicals/lecture, as we also had clinicals for community health).

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Specializes in NICU.

I also had a senior Capstone (preceptorship). It was 135 clinical hours (eleven 12 hr shifts plus an evidence-based project). I felt that it helped me get hands-on experience once I started working as a nurse because I had no clinicals in the NICU during nursing school.

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Specializes in Trauma Surgery.

Sounds... interesting. What state do you live in?

I just graduated in May with my ADN instead of BSN but we still had preceptorship. Honestly, I can't remember how many hours I had to precept. I think that I had to precept for 120 hours (10 12 hour shifts) with a nurse on the unit we were assigned. In addition to that, we had a day of lecture each week that needed to be fit around our precepting schedules. I got pretty luck for the most part though for several reasons. First, a good chunk of my classmates had to have multiple nurse preceptors due to schedule conflicts, etc. and I was fortunate enough to have a great preceptor who's schedule I could work with almost to a tee. Also, they liked me so much that they pretty much offered me a spot when I passed boards. This semester is definitely the most important and even though you have six other students in the groups, there should be some parts opportunities for you to be able to show how you stand out compared to your clinical students. Take any chance you get to prove that you stand out!

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