Male LPN in Rn pgm through Excelsior moving to Eielson AFB Feb 10th 2010...advice!!

Grapenut · Feb 10, 2010

Welcome to Alaska. I came up as a travel nurse 11/08 in order to make enough money to do the CPNE. It took me a couple of months to get over the move, my new environment, etc, before I could get myself to settle down and study. So I began the CPNE study insanity about January 09. I dragged out the studying and finally took the CPNE in July and passed, graduation date was 9/18/09, took the NCLEX 10/26/09 and passed. I work in Southeast Alaska. I have 4 years med-surg experience as an LPN in a state where we start IVs, do IV push meds, other things that I have learned LPNs don't do in Alaska. We've fallen in love with Alaska and now we don't want to leave. I can give you info about graduating EC, but I haven't made it farther north than SE Alaska. We'd like to get to Anchorage at some point though. I'll be happy to answer any questions I can to help you with your CPNE experience. It's very stressful but with the experience you have I'm sure you'll pass!

pcolaqtfighter77 · Feb 17, 2010

thanks for your advice...we made it to eielson afb in 9 days, all the way from florida, driving 8 hour days then stopping...living in north pole till this friday, got base housing already...we got lucky...i applied for a job once i got my alaska temp license while still in florida...i was contacted by the diector in fairbanks and should be interviewing this week.....as for my excelsior studies iam slated to take essentials of health care safety at the pearson UAF campus on March 4th,,,wish me good luck...other than the nursing concept tests, i think i need a/p 2---which i can take local distance learning and tfer (already took a/p 1 in fl--if i took the excelsior a/p 6 credit course i would have to do cardiac heart electric matrix again, im not going there..lol) i plan on doing one test a week, especially if i work full time...i bought study guides from study group 101 for each nursing test..plus i browse through the med surge book in conjunction with the sylibus....alaska is nice..its 15 f outside, and feels like 40f people tell me it has been a very kind winter....anyway i hope to get a job quickly....where i come from Iam IV certified, all but pushing narcs IV..the Alaska practice act looks pretty much the same as fl, except for minor differences...IM pretty good at IV's, and i had a friend who used to live in Juneau (LPN) and she used to start IV's..not a biggie, but sometimes the more skills the more marketable,,,my old hospital in Florida required me and other LPN's to take and pass ACLS, PALS and standard provider BLS...either way it will prepare me to become an even better RN once im at that stage...please KIT...i dont know a soul up here !!!!

Grapenut · Feb 18, 2010

We drove from the deep south also. We left on a Saturday driving, made it to Seattle by Wednesday night and spent 2 nights with a friend there, left Seattle and drove to Bellingham Friday morning to catch the Alaska Marine Highway to our final destination, and that took 2 and 1/2 more days; arrived on Sunday and started my new job on Monday. LPNs did everything the RNs did at the hospital where I worked back home except charge of course. But I watched what they did all those years (and sometimes did it for them if they were busy!). So I definitely feel ready for the responsibility now. When I was working my way through the core stuff and nursing content, I paced myself at an exam a month. We already know the material. It's not like they teach you anything different in biology or anatomy & physiology or any of the other stuff. So most of it is a review. People's criticism of the distance program is that we don't do clinicals. I had to do 750 clinical hours spread out over a year in every unit in the hospital as an LPN. The ADN and BSN students doing clinicals when I was there that year didn't do even 1/2 what we did. Congratulations on making it up here and pursuing your degree. I'll send you a private message with more specific info.