New york city nurses. Help!

Farawyn · Feb 5, 2016

Congrats!

Are you licensed in NY or Spain?

teochap · Feb 5, 2016

I am licensed in both places. Spain and set State of NY :) an RN.

DoGoodThenGo · Feb 6, 2016

Hello Fellows!
my name in Teresa and I just passed the NCLEX!
I am a nurse from Spain who would like to start working in NYC. I was interesting in the ER field. However, I feel that I should listen to other nurses about their experiences because this system seems complicated for me. I have no idea about Unions, what is the difference between working in a public or private hospital.
Could you help a little to clarify this?
Thank you all!

Very broad information provided; for more detailed responses you might wish to consider posting over on the "New York" forum in the US Nurses section.

In New York City the pubic hospitals are owned and operated by New York State or City government. This would mainly be the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NYC_Health_%2B_Hospitals

All other hospitals in New York are "private" meaning they are owned by and or part of various non-profit entities. New York State does not allow for profit hospitals so you don't have to worry what they are if you want to work in this state/city.

While formerly independent most of the remaining private hospitals in New York City are part of large healthcare networks.

Mount Sinai - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Sinai_Health_System

New York Presbyterian - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NewYork%E2%80%93Presbyterian_Hospital

North Shore - Long Island Jewish - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Shore-LIJ_Health_System

New York University - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NYU_Langone_Medical_Center

Montefiore Medical Center - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montefiore_Medical_Center

Together these five health care systems cover nearly all the remaining private hospitals in Manhattan, much of Staten Island along with parts of Queens, Brooklyn and the Bronx. There are smaller independent hospitals still in Brooklyn (Interfaith, Wycoff, Methodist, etc...) but there you are.

Main union representing professional nurses in New York City and State is the New York State Nurses Association. Unions in New York are much like the CCOO and the UGT in Spain. That is they negotiate rights, benefits, wages, and working conditions for members.

Not all hospitals in New York City have unionized nurse staffing even within the same system. In some cases the nurses belong to one union (NYSNA) and support personnel (technicians, nursing assistants, etc... ) belong to a service union (1199).

In order to get a better idea of differences you would have to compare specific institutions in terms of working conditions, pay, benefits, and so on.

If you already are licensed to practice in New York State as a RN *and* have either legal status (Green Card) or are a US citizen you apply for work same as any other nurse. As New York City has a large Hispanic/Latino population your bilingual skills *may* prove useful in finding employment. Am not saying it will be easy.