Leadership, Community, Pharm, and RN comp ATI 2016 tips

Hello nursing students. I used this site a lot throughout nursing school for advice. It was very helpful, so I wanted to give some of my own advice for ATI on this site. I will be covering the leadership, community, pharm, and RN comp ATI’s.

First, ALWAYS do all practice questions and tests available for all tests!! Read ALL the rationales to help you understand why the options would be wrong/right.

Leadership: It's very important that you read the whole book. They do especially like to ask about prioritization (what patient to see first) and delegation (what can a UAP do vs LPN vs RN). Also, they like to ask about quality improvement. I found quality improvement hard to study for because there's only a small section in the book about it but the practice test on the ATI site is very helpful. You could also get another prioritization/delegation book which has very similar questions and were very helpful. Also, I would strongly recommend reading through the community ATI book before you take leadership. There were a lot of questions about community on the leadership ATI.

Community: I would also recommend reading the whole book. A lot questions are about infectious diseases. So make sure you know all the signs and symptoms and PPE when you're caring for a patient with an infectious disease. But make sure you read through everything else too. Also, I think it would be a good idea to just know immunizations and when you get them.

Pharm: I totally slacked on studying for pharm. In desperation, I bought Cathy Parkes Pharmacology flash cards because I knew I wouldn’t have time to study the whole book. I ONLY studied these cards. I studied them nonstop for a few weeks. I walked on the treadmill every day for an hour or more and repeated them until I knew EVERY SINGLE word on the card... I got a 94%. Others in my class listened to the videos that Cathy Parkes had and did okay as well.

RN COMP: I’m basically going to say what most other people say on this site. You definitely need to focus on your weak areas. I found that I had an equal amount of questions from each specific area of nursing (ex. Peds 15 questions, OB 16 questions, etc.) on the RN comp. So do not underestimate and study for just med surg and pharm. There is plenty of med surg and pharm on there as well. Go through content area that you are weak in for those topics too. Then briefly review what you’re already good at. I started studying 5 weeks ahead of time over all the content. However, I would say that 5 weeks is not enough time to study. I felt stressed and I spent most of my days reading the ATI book and taking notes in a separate note book. So, I would say start about 8 weeks early to review all the content and really take it all in. Also, whatever content that you review early (like if you review OB first) go back about every week or 2 weeks and retake the practice tests so that you don't forget what you studied. Other than that, I would say that it is very important to know your lab values!! Also don't forget about infectious diseases. ATI likes to focus on infectious diseases (mostly in the community book).

Final note: Many students in my class used Cathy Parks ATI videos to help them. They also bought the flash cards that she made. I watched a few of her videos and there were very helpful. They covered some super important things that ATI liked to focus on. I personally am not a great auditory learner though, so I preferred to read the books and take my own notes. My method worked well, and I easily passed the ATI’s. My classmates who just watched the videos also did well. It just depends on how you learn. You can do it!! Good luck!!