newbie nurse trying to find my niche

[luv2surf]

Please bare with me I have visited this site quite frequently during nursing school and prior to NCLEX. I'm baaackkk........I could use some advice from veteran nurses. So here goes........I am a mature nurse 48 years old mature and I passed NCLEX in August. I moved back to San Diego,California to take care of my mother who is elderly. I accepted a position at a very well known institution on a surgical acute floor. It is very fast paced and I'm learning tons and stressed to no end. I am in my last week of orientation, and I should be grateful that I've lasted this long and have a job, but I started looking for new grad positions in the ED. I enjoyed my clinical rotations in ED in school, but I was told that I should probably try to get one year of med-surg under my belt. Being as I am a older nurse, I don't know if I should stick it out in Surgical Acute, I'm not happy in surgical acute, or should I should I take my chances and apply to a new grad program offering a preceptorship in ED, or stick it out on surgical acute for a year. Its not like I'm a spring chicken, its like my biological clock is ticking for the ED. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[User123456]

congrats on passing boards!! Most reccommend the year of M/S. it will go by super fast im sure espcially since you described it as so busy. and doing the M/S will allow you to get a better view of other depts. good luck!!!

[tiggerdagibit]

We were just talking about this in class the other day. My instructor said that many people think you should start off in med-surg to get experience. She said that she doesn't necessarily believe that. If you know where you want to be and have the opportunity to go there, do it! I tend to agree with her. If you want to be in the ED and get a job offer, I'd take it. Especially being a new grad, they will know that you don't have tons of experience and they often have longer orientations than for experienced nurses/general units. I will graduate in May and went to a few interviews in December. The TICU and ED both offer 6 month orientations as opposed to 12 weeks in other units. I got a job offer for TICU and I accepted it. I'm scared to death, but they know I'm a new grad and they have a great program for that, including the 6 months and sending me to several classes. I don't know how long your orientation was, but at my future hospital, I believe we have to stay on a unit for 6 months before we can transfer. That may be something you need to find out.