LPN Dilema

I am in a situation, much like a lot of other people. I have a B.S. in healthcare and went back to school for my nursing degree. I have all of the pre-requisites necessary for the nursing program, but lack the clinical part. My problem is financially i am tapped out i cannot get any loans from any school because they are all two year. I did get a private loan and that was a mistake because I dropped below six hours or basically I did not have any classes to take torward the rn program, and am now repaying on three college loans. My gripe, to make a long story short is why do people refer to lpn's as glorified cna's. I have worked with lpn's before as a tech at a hospital, and some of the best nurses were lpn's who I thought were very well educated. I know I am rambling, but I am a 32 year old male, and my only option for me to get money coming back in is to go the lpn route and gain experience, and then let the hospital pay for it while I go for my rn. I know this has probably been asked before, but do you enjoy being an lpn? Oh, and taking care of patients that is a given. I have been told by many nurses that I am very good with patients.

Yes, I enjoy being an LPN, and I do not feel like I am just a "glorified CNA".

I went to school and trained for a year.

I have a license, and I work hard at what I do.

I work in MR/DDS, taking care of mentally and physically challenged people.

I give alot of medications, my main job duty, I have to know the indications,

dosage range, side effects, of every pill I give.

I evaluate people for complaints of illnesses and give them appointments to see the physician.

So tell me.....do CNAs do this every day? No, they do NOT.

CNAs and LPNs are a world apart.

Glorified CNA......not bloody likely. I graduated from LPN school in Aug of 2004 and landed the only job I applied for at the only place I wanted to work here at Hamot Hospital in Erie. No course in the world LPN or RN could prepare you for your first job in an acute care setting. Hamot is a 491 bed acurte care facility and I work on the 6th floor which is all med/surg. We have 48 beds per floor and one side of the floor is all heart patients and the other side is general surgery and bariatric surg.. To say there is a lot to learn is an understatement but I can tell you this: put your clinical skills up against a new RN grad and we wipe the floor with them. Most of the RN students have 350 clinical hours vs our 1050 hours and it shows because half of them have never given an injection , started a foley, changed a wound vac, or done much in the way of dressing changes to name a few. On my floor I have my OWN 8 patient assignment and with the exception of: hanging blood prod,IV push and hanging TPN (all of which I could do if it werent for some antiquated practice act) I do it all. I assess each patient, document against a careplan for each patient (every shift), pass med's, do treatments and am held to the same level of accountability as the RN's. I am responsible for all my own patient discharges, take orders from DR's, call DR's when there is a problem and feel the stress of working in an unbelieveably fast paced environment. To top it all of my rate of pay is $12.74/hr which is really lousy but I decided that if I wanted to improve my skills I needed to be in a place where I would be constantly challenged and brother did I ever find it. Its not easy when you are a 51 year old guy and starting a new career but even though I was laid off I went to school to do something I really wanted to do so I paid for it myself (not retraining program for this guy) and I havent looked back yet. I have decided that I can no longer work for the type of money that I mentioned above and have accepted a new position at anothe r acute care facility which will again be a med/surg setting however the pay is much much better (16.10/hr, 3-12's paid for 40 7a-7p, and a 2000.00 sign on bonus) so I will say to you hang in there. Pursue the job you want and dont take no for an answer. WE can and do the job in acute care. Its just a matter of getting your foot in the door and then showing them you know your stuff......good luck..... P.S. The AJN showed statistics about a year ago comparing RN mortality vs LPN mortality rates in acute care and believe it or not the numbers were only tenths of a point off from each other.