Pennsylvania does not accept license from RN program

lovinglife2015 · Apr 13, 2015

Not at all. Though you obviously failed miserably in seeing the facetiousness of my statement. Oh, the hubris.

PacoUSA, BSN, RN · Apr 13, 2015

Not at all. Though you obviously failed miserably in seeing the facetiousness of my statement. Oh, the hubris.

Aww, it's so nice that I inspired you to reuse my words ... just remember to properly quote me next time in APA format .. K, Ms. Hubris? Ciao!

* Off to update my Ig List *

PMFB-RN, RN · Apr 14, 2015

And I find it amusing that the required experience settings for this (med/surg, L/D and acute peds) are the settings LEAST likely to hire a LPN. Especially a LPN with such flimsy credentials. The great majority of LPNs find themselves in LTC, where they function as charge nurses, supervise CNAs, admit patients, discharge patients, assess patients, page physicicians, send residents to the ER, take and note orders.... all things which I doubt very much will be helped by years of aide experience, no matter the setting.

I was an LVN in California before I completed an LPN to RN program at a community college and became an RN. I obtained my LVN by challenging the Ca LVN boards based on my experience as a medic in the army. After 4 years serving as a combat medic in infantry units I was assinged to work in a large, very modern army hospital. During my time in the army I spent a total of 58 weeks in medical training courses. This is in addition to strictly military training like basic training, jump school, infantry support school, air assault school, etc. Medical training was very intense. Alwasy 8-10 hours a day, 5 to 6 days a week and high stakes. For example I learned A&P in a very intense 6 weeks that included a cadaver lab, disecting several different kinds of animals, hours and hours of looking through a microscope, and lectures taught by physicians and APNs. For example Neuro A&P was taught by a nurologists, cardiac A&P was taught by a cardiologist, (same officer physician who later taught EKG), and so on.

When I went to work in the hospital I knew that military medics could challenge the Ca LVN boards, but that they needed specific training and time spent in various inpatient units. I brough the requirments to my CO (an RN nurse corps officer). She bent over backwards to make sure I was sent to work and learn in all the required inpatient units. Whenever I would go to a new unit she made sure to tell the nurse corps officers working that unit that I was preparing to take LVN-NCLEX when I got out. Those nurse corps officers went out of their way to teach and train me. Many loaned me books from their time in nursing school and guided & tutored me in my off duty studies. I spent many off duty hours studying in the library of a local community college that had an ADN RN program and had all the the course text books available.

As soon as I got my LPN license I applied to a huge hospital in LA and was hired on the spot (it was a different time in nursing). I was hired for med-surg, but never actually worked there. The manager of the burn unit ICU noticed me and it turns out she was a former army nurse corps officer who had helped train me when we were both on active duty. She asked if I wanted to work in burn ICU. Of course I jumped at the chance! The unit was very high intensity and RN turn over was huge. They were buring out RNs left and right and couldn't keep the unit staffed with the kind of nurses they needed. On any one shift 12-15 nurses would come on duty and half of them would be on OT or travelers.

As an LPN I couldn't assess patients. The work around developed by the manager was to pre-co-sign the trifolds (as my RN clinical supervisor) we used for charting our assessments, and everything else (pre computer charting days!). I would come to work, go into the manager's office and take out one or two of the pre-co-signed tri-folds and take report just like any other nurse coming on for that shift. Seems crazy to me now and was obviously unethical and possibly illegal. I was new to nursing and at the time didn't see the issue since as a medic in the army I had been used to a greatly expanded scope of practice than any RN has. Those were desperate times for nurse managers trying to to keep a high burn out unit staffed.They would post openings and no one would apply! They started offering large cash insentives for nurses. New grads were getting $10K sign on bonuses and their choice of units.

After a couple years I quite that job to come to Wisconsin to complete the LPN to RN program in two semesters. (I looked and called all over the country and Wisconsin offered the best deal, mainly becuase the university and technical college systems are both designated veterans oppertunity systems). Due to my previous experience I didn't really learn anything in the RN program, except about mental health, an area I didn't have much training in previously.

I felt then, and still feel, that I could have easily challenged the NCLEX RN and passed no problem. That was actually an option in a couple states, like West Virgina.

realnursealso/LPN, LPN · Apr 14, 2015

I want to know when she took the LPN Boards in NYS, because it it not allowed, and hasn't been for some time. Too lazy for me to look up when they stopped allowing this, but it has been more than a year for sure. When did you take the exam?

Home Health Columnist / Guide · Apr 14, 2015

Thread closed as member received advice and run it's course.

TheCommuter, BSN, RN · Apr 14, 2015

I want to know when she took the LPN Boards in NYS, because it it not allowed, and hasn't been for some time. Too lazy for me to look up when they stopped allowing this, but it has been more than a year for sure.

I believe the cutoff date was 2007.