2016 PN NCLEX

[bbradshaw]

Okay so I know when I was in nursing school I tried to do as much research as I could about the NCLEX and even though I found out 95% of the information I was looking for there were still some questions I had that were left unanswered so I thought I would share my NCLEX experience and everything that I think a nursing student might want to know if they're reading this. I'm glad to answer and questions you have as well!

First a little back story, I went to a PN program here in Oklahoma (which will remain anonymous). My program had us do HESI exams, which for those of you that aren't familiar with the HESI, they're basically tests that are written very similar to the NCLEX and from what I heard it's supposed to be a very accurate indicator on how well you will do on the real thing. We had to take 6 HESI's, one after each of the courses it was for. We took one for fundamentals, maternity, pediatrics, med surg, pharmacology, and then an exit HESI which was just a comprehensive over everything. I did really well on all of mine except maternity, mainly because I struggled with that class.

Moving on to the stuff you actually want to hear. My last day of school was May 20th 2016, my school mailed our transcripts May 26th 2016, and I received my ATT June 7th 2016 which was on a Tuesday. I had the option to schedule my NCLEX that same Friday but I chose a date for the following week so I could have a little extra time to study so I chose to test June 16th which gave me only 9 days to study. My theory is, you either know it or you don't. All I did to study was practice questions on the NCLEX app on my phone and on the computer with the code my NCLEX book gave me.

Now when you go to take your test I cannot stress enough to literally bring yourself, your drivers license, and your car keys. Put your purse, wallet, phone, or whatever else in your trunk. It'll save you a lot of hassle.

The actual NCLEX was a lot of patient education, delegation, and which patient would you see first based off of their condition. Read the questions carefully because they go back and forth between "which is the BEST answer" and "which would cause the nurse to intervene" types of questions. I had 1 dosage calc question and maybe 2 lab value questions. I also had 28 select all that apply questions which I absolutely loathe. If the answer has always or never in it, you can almost immediately eliminate it. They want to make sure that you're going to do the right thing in the situation they put you in.

My computer cut off at 85 questions which is the minimum for the PN NCLEX and it took me 2 hours, (I'm not the type of person who dwells on a question for 5 minutes, if I absolutely didn't know it I would just pick the one that sounded the most right and move on because that's what I've always been taught.) I walked out of there bawling because I think that's the normal feeling for anyone after their NCLEX. Now I live in Oklahoma and my name was posted on our BON website Saturday June 19th at 4 or 5am, which was less than 48 hours later, I really wish I would've recorded my reaction because it was priceless.

If anyone has any questions feel free to ask and I'll answer them to the best of my ability! Good luck future NCLEX takers!