Med-Surg RN Looking to Join Mother Baby

[Soliloquy, MSN, APRN, NP]

I've been an RN for about 8 months and counting and I've worked as Med-Surg nurse for all of them. However, I'm looking to move over to Mother baby and was wondering if my experience in Med-Surg (with no experience in Mother baby aside from clinicals) would deter hiring managers? What would they be looking for if I were to apply to work on a Mother Baby unit? is Med-Surg experience a plus or would they not really care?

[babyrn85]

Experience in a clinical setting is never a deterrent. OB is an area that takes a while to train to so a lot of places are going to look for the experienced OB/LD/NURSERY nurse first. But you have strengths over a new grad or someone coming in from an outpatient setting. Go for it and don't give up if that's really where you want to be.

[iPink, BSN, RN]

Have you look within your hospital system to see about transferring to the mother/baby unit? That is what I did. I stayed on my critical care unit for a year then transferred to the women's hospital. When I started I met plenty of nurses who came from med/surg or other telemetry/critical care floors.

Check your hospital policy regarding transfers. Some want you to spend 6 months on your unit before transferring. Also, if you are a GN (a nurse with less then 1 year experience) with a contract, the units can take that into consideration.

[estrellaCR, BSN, RN]

L and D and Mother Baby at my hospital hired nurses with MedSurg experience. So you are not at a disadvantage as you will already know how to do medsurg procedures on the patients, we have L and D and postpartum patients needing cath, wound care, blood transfusion, IV insert, etc.

[miranda819, BSN]

I started in med-surg too. I stayed in med-surg for about 4 1/2 months then went into postpartum and now I'm on a mother-baby unit. You will use your med-surg experience. From taking care of c-section patients with wound vacs, to blood transfusions, IV starts, and tons of patient teaching. It is do-able, I'm proof! Good luck!