Not sure where to go to obtain the best experience, as a new nurse

umcRN, BSN, RN · Aug 3, 2012

I say go wherever you can get a job. That's probably not the advice you were wanting to hear but the job market is VERY tight these days, especially for new grads, especially for new grad LPN's. If you get a job offer, wherever it is, take it.

uRNmyway, ASN, RN · Aug 3, 2012

finishing nursing school this year has been one of the biggest achievement s in my life. all of a sudden, i have whole new set of skills. every day i am asked “what area of nursing are you going into?” all i can say is i am not for sure. i know i need to gain experience as a nurse and i am not really sure of how to get there. the one thing, i do know is i do not want to do long term care anymore. i am burnt out with it. i want have new experiences. i love doing patient care and want to stay hands on. i really enjoyed working as a cna. just need a change of scenery.
should i go back to long term care as an lpn and gain experience that way?
is the fact that i have worked as a cna for five years going to make a difference when applying for jobs?
i need something that will be flexible enough to allow me to finish college. since, i already have my pre requisites for the r.n. program completed. i really do not want to waste the time and money; i have put in school already.
as an lpn, i would love to do hospice. i have also looked into a mental health hospital. i have also placed an application with a drug and alcohol detox company. this company has called me back for an interview.
i am looking for some suggestions.
what would be my best route to take so that i have flexibility to finish school and also get good experience?

ok, well i guess it all depends on what kind of experience you want to gain. if that is your priority, you need to be more specific. do you want any old job/work experience? then stick to ltc, where you already probably have an in since you have worked it before.

do you want skills experience? then mental health/drug and alcohol rehab are definitely not the place for that. you would need to either do med-surg, float pool, that kind of thing to gain the best experience with skills.

however, if the skills you want to improve are communication skills, then yeah, im sure mental health or rehab would work fine!

but unless you plan on staying in mental health or rehab for a long time, i would not recommend it straight out of school. when it comes to skills, you really need to work on them and re-inforce all the learning you have done. you need to practice to really establish knowing how to do all these things. if you go into mental health or whatever, anything that does not have much nursing skills, ive heard nurses say that you very quickly forget how to do these things.

rlockd · Aug 3, 2012

I want to gain clinical experience and skills. I would eventually like to do burns or be a SANE nurse. The problem i am running into is it hard to find jobs that allow LPNs on a med/surg floor which i know that is what i really need to do. I did most of my clinical roution on a med/surg floor. I lack a year of having my associate degree.

uRNmyway, ASN, RN · Aug 3, 2012

Hmmm...I wonder if you could write in your resume about being so close to your associates degree, and that if hired as an LPN in their hospital you would stick around as an RN when you graduate. Make some calls to HR and nursing recruiters. Or sometimes, hospitals have hospices or LTC associated with them. Maybe offer to work there if you can transfer to med-surg once licensed. Just a possibility I guess.

rlockd · Aug 3, 2012

this is a good idea. I will give this a try.