I am a new graduate RN and want to get myself in critical care, I worked super hard in nursing school towards my career goal and got myself a very good grade (almost 4.0 GPA). I want to get myself into critical care but I cannot find a ICU resident opening right now. However, I got two offer from 2 hospitals, should I choose the Cardiac PCU RN resident in our state's second largest hospital that is 2 hours driving from home or a regular med-surg staff RN in a local small community hospital that is 10 mins driving from home? The hour pay is pretty much same, I don't want to eventually move up to the bigger city but I see the PCU RN resident as an opportunity to get myself into local ICU in the future. Also, I have family with young kids. I cannot make my decision, the local hospital has a lot pros, all my family and friends think I should work locally, it's only 10 min drive, but I cannot see potential growth of my career if I work in here.
A 2 hr commute each way is insane for a nursing job. No way should you take that offer.
Let's say you are scheduled to work a 12 hr day shift, 7a-7p and you need to be there by 6:45am. That means leaving by 4:45am if there's no traffic on your commute. If it's the state's 2nd largest hospital and in a bigger city, I'm going to guess that you'd be dealing with some rush hour traffic so you'd have to leave even earlier. Then you work your 12 hrs but wait, someone working an evening shift called out and you get mandated to stay until 11pm. By the time you leave, it's 11:30pm and then you have a 2 hr drive home and enough time for 2-2 1/2 hrs of sleep when you get home before you get to wake up and do it all again tomorrow.
When I worked in the hospital, I never lived more than 5 1/2 miles from my workplace. I still fell asleep on the way home after night shifts on the regular (fortunately I took public transportation). In no way would it be safe to drive 2 hrs home after working all night. Your post doesn't say if the big city hospital is days, nights or a rotation. IDK about where you live but where I live, all hospitals in the city have their staff on day/night rotation to start.
I would take the med-surg position at the local hospital. If you can handle the med-surg unit, I think that will be good experience and it will look good on your resume. A 12-hour nursing shift will drain the life out of you and is very exhausting... a 2-hour commute will make it 10 times worse and it is actually dangerous considering that you can potentially work the night shift.
KelRN215, BSN, RN
1 Article; 7,349 Posts
A 2 hr commute each way is insane for a nursing job. No way should you take that offer.
Let's say you are scheduled to work a 12 hr day shift, 7a-7p and you need to be there by 6:45am. That means leaving by 4:45am if there's no traffic on your commute. If it's the state's 2nd largest hospital and in a bigger city, I'm going to guess that you'd be dealing with some rush hour traffic so you'd have to leave even earlier. Then you work your 12 hrs but wait, someone working an evening shift called out and you get mandated to stay until 11pm. By the time you leave, it's 11:30pm and then you have a 2 hr drive home and enough time for 2-2 1/2 hrs of sleep when you get home before you get to wake up and do it all again tomorrow.
When I worked in the hospital, I never lived more than 5 1/2 miles from my workplace. I still fell asleep on the way home after night shifts on the regular (fortunately I took public transportation). In no way would it be safe to drive 2 hrs home after working all night. Your post doesn't say if the big city hospital is days, nights or a rotation. IDK about where you live but where I live, all hospitals in the city have their staff on day/night rotation to start.