Need advice from Lehigh Valley area Nurses

rnlooking · Nov 14, 2006

Hello,
I am returning home to the Allentown area after 7 years abroad working as a nurse in the UK. I graduated from nursing school in the Lehigh Valley and went abroad not long afterwards so I'm out of the loop a bit.
Does anyone have any opinions on which hospitals over there are decent places to work? Some people tell me Lehigh Valley is the best and others say St. Luke's is better. I am hoping I can to get a full time job at either LVH, or St. Luke's but I have been out of the country for so long that I am looking for a place with a brilliant orientation. This would help me get used American hospitals once again.
I'll be flying over to visit my parents in a couple of months and was going to see of I can shadow a nurse/observe for a shift at one or both hospitals to see what I think. Is that allowed? I do have a Pennsylvania nursing license.
If anyone has time to give me some advice I would appreciate it very much.
Thanks!

I have been with LVH for about 5 years and it really depends on what unit you work on. Word of mouth is stay away from TSU, they have an outrageous patient to nurse ratio (9-12 per nurse) and the patient acuity has increased. LVH is one of the lower paying. I think LVH is just getting too big and forgetting their employees. Pay raises are lacking. I have heard good things about St Lukes, looking to go there myself.

jewll27 · Nov 15, 2006

I have been with LVH for about 5 years and it really depends on what unit you work on. Word of mouth is stay away from TSU, they have an outrageous patient to nurse ratio (9-12 per nurse) and the patient acuity has increased. LVH is one of the lower paying. I think LVH is just getting too big and forgetting their employees. Pay raises are lacking. I have heard good things about St Lukes, looking to go there myself.

I go to school @ St Lukes and they are nice. Allentwn campus is beautiful and they are working on expanding the cardiac unit there. They are starting to switch over to 12 hr shifts but a lot of units still do 8s. The starting pay @ st lukes right now for someone with little to no expereience is $22.05/hr but they have a pretty good benefits program. I am unsure about bonuses and whatnot for non-students. Good luck!

CarVsTree · Nov 25, 2006

I have worked at LVH - CC (there Level 1 Trauma Center on I-78) for two years. It is a great place to work. Starting pay at all the area hospitals for a new grad is about the same, $22-23/hour. I got a 5% pay raise and in June 2006 I got a raise (it was basically a cost of living increase. So my starting RN pay (was a tech first) in January was $22.50, got a 1$ increase after passing boards, then we got about 80 cents I think in June and then I got a 5% raise in October.

I don't feel like a number at all. I work on the transitional trauma unit and we are like a family (albeit a bit dysfunctional at times). We work very closely with the trauma attendings and have a lot of support from educators, other nurses, etc. Night shift (which I work can be a bit rough), but they just started putting clinical educators on night shift to help new nurses, orientees.

The orientation program for new nurses at LVH is much better than at Luke's, Sacred Heart, Easton, or WArren Hospital just over the NJ border. My friends at St. Lukes were thrown into the fire with a full patient load by day 2 or 3 with phone, docs, etc. I had a 12 week orientation, and started with 1, then 2, then 4, then 6 patients. My unit has a ratio of 6:1 because trauma patients are often very complicated. I have only had to take 8 2x and never for a full shift. On regular med/surg units they are usu. 6-8:1 at night, 6:1 on days.

I worked at Sacred Heart as a tech for a few months before getting into LVH. It is a small urban/community hospital. I would not want to be a new med/surg nurse there because it is so small that you may be one of only 2 nurses on a floor (census can be low) this would leave you with only one nurse to question when not sure what to do.

I had clinicals in nursing school at LVH, St. Luke's, Sacred Heart, and Easton and I would only want to work at LVH.

I forgot to mentin St. Luke's has higher ratios. When I was on their ortho floor during nursing school the nurses had 8-10 patients. That of course was a couple of years ago, not sure if they're improving on that to try and compet with LVH.

Also, if you're interested in trauma, LVH-CC is the way to go. We are the busiest Level 1 trauma center in the state. I love trauma so here I am and here I'll stay.

Feel free to fire questions at me (OP or anyone else). Feel free to pm me for the nursing contact person to setup shadowing, etc.