OB interview!!!! Help!

[scrubnurse]

Hi all!

I am going for an interview next week for a L&D RN position. I am very excited and wanted to get your thoughts/opinions. First some background on myself: I have worked in the OR for over 12 years, first as an OR tech, then I went to nursing school and graduated a year and a half ago. I love the OR, but have become slightly bored with it. I feel like I am ready to spread my nursing wings and see what else is out there. I have always said that if anything were to get me out of the OR, it would be OB. I could totally see myself as an OB nurse, but I am soooo nervous about learning something new. I have three children, my youngest is three months old. Even while I was in labor, I kept thinking my nurses have a very rewarding job. Everyone remembers their L&D nurse, good or bad! I just think I would really enjoy the patient teaching (my patients are asleep in the OR).

The interview is for the Baylor position, working weekends only. Work 24 hours (two 12 hour shifts) and get paid for 36 hours. It is a night shift, 7pm-7am. This would totally work for my family, as I could be home all week to take the kids to school, go on field trips, etc. and not have to worry about daycare for the baby and also if the kids are out on school breaks, get sick, etc.

My questions are: Has anyone worked the weekends only shift? Has it worked out for you? How scary is OB? How many patients do you usually have? What is the norm for RN-patient ratio? How long is orientation usually? What questions should I ask during my interview?

Thanks in advance!

[SmilingBluEyes]

You asked the questions HERE you should ask in your interview.....very good questions.

I love what I do, although I am finally about to get off nightshift after 7 straight years on it (on and off, nine). I have had enough of it.

Lots of people do Baylor type plans and love it. As long as you can sleep all day and your family/s/o support this, you will do ok. But you have to remain very committed to your sleeptime, as do they, or it won't work.

As far as the other questions, those are ones you should ask when being interviewed. Patient-staff ratios vary a lot and especially, do, depending on whether you are a hospital that does Labor and Delivery and Mother-baby as separate units, or you are an LDRP (all of them together). Staffing gets shifted a lot in LDRPs, so you have to be able to do them all, and well, and also be willing to shift patient loads around a lot as the census changes.

Ask these questions when the time comes for the interview and decide for yourself, if this is for you. It's obviously, very different than OR nursing-----and you may or may not love it. Depends on how much you love being in the OR I guess.

Good luck whatever you do decide.

[linda8532]

I have been a labor nurse my entire career and am so burnt out on it. I am sick of being treated like crap from the patients families when their loved ones are in pain. I can do only so much without a doctor's order. You spend 12 hours catering to their every whim and the doc comes in, delivers the baby, gets all the thanks, then leaves. You always have to be smiling even though you want to wring their necks. Depending on the hospital size and level of care it can be a very stressful position. Good luck to you.