Pardon my ignorance..

Hi all! I have been working as a child/adolescent psych nurse right out of school for about 6 months and have already worked at 2 facilities ( in different states). I truly do love my work-as you know some days are better than others, and am overall happy with my job. (the political junk aside :angryfire ). #1- I would love to do traveling nursing but am concerned that if I were to that it would be in facilites that were more prison like because they can't find staff to adequetly work in them (am I totally off?). Also, so many positions if I ever wanted to go to a speciality field say "1 year experience" and 'med surg preferred'. So if I had 5 years of psych experience and wanted to go to a different field would they even consider me because its not 'med-surg' related? While I don't work the floor and push IV meds, I assess and deal with medical problems on a fairly regular basis. I know it depends on the specific facility, etc. but I was wondering overall what you all thought about these things...Thanks a lot..

My facility is no Prison but we use travelers.

Yes, med/surg experience is a good thing to have. If you make a concerted effort to maintain your physical accessment skills via inservices and courses you can . Consider volunteering for an ambulence or rescue organization.

Part of the reason they often want med-surg skills is because you can be floated.

I'm more or less in the same position. I just started as a new grad, but would like to do travel nursing once I've been working for a year or two. I think it probably is that they want you to be able to float.. But I'm sure there's plenty of agencies that are desperate enough to take us anyhow. What do you think?

Part of the reason they often want med-surg skills is because you can be floated.