Sha-Sha RN

I agree that this is a question best posed to the employers who are requesting it. My thought about it is maybe there will be some inpatient rotation/hours required with the job and a lot of hospitals are now requiring ACNP cert to work anywhere in the hospital.

H to the E to the double hockey stick no! No way I would apply for that. That must be a typo especially given the population and expectations. I would stay working as a bedside RN and wasting for something else to come along or do some per diem work as a np. Medicare home visits is a good way to get your foot in the door with some experience.

But someone who is lazy may get hired based on his/her RN experience on paper- you can't see laziness on paper; this usually gets discovered later. When I was searching for my first NP job, I got a lot of interviews based on my RN experience and many of the questions asked during the interviews focused on my role as a RN. No one asked my about my experience during my NP clinical rotations, other than the job I ultimately accepted and they really didn't ask either. I mentioned to them about my experience and exposure at a outpatient Diabetes clinic during my last clinical rotation.

My hospital still documents on paper and there is a special flowsheet to document the FS, bolus amounts and basal rates for pumps. There is an order in the EHR for the pump settings but monitoring is done on paper. I'm sure that flowsheet will have to be made into an electronic version once the Nurses start to document directly into our EHR.

As others have said uptodate, epocrates. I also find medscape and physicians reference helpful.

Sounds like insulin resistance without knowing his insulin doses. If he's type 2 then he makes insulin but it's not working with the glucose like it should. If he does snack what is he snacking on and what time of the day. How much sliding scale coverage does he get? He may need a set premeal/nutritional insulin dose along with a correction scale and a little more Lantus. Why is the lantus split bid, does he get a large total amount for the day? Is he only on insulin, no oral regimen. What type of setting is this, inpatient or long term care?

With the new consensus model and the specialization become more specific between acute care NP and family/ adult np specialization based in primary care it will be important to find out will you be hired as a FNP to work in an ER. I know some hospital still hire FNPs to work in an acute setting based on their nursing experience, but I'm not sure how long this will happen. As far as preceptor yes I have heard there are programs (mainly online, but some brick and mortar schools) that require you to have preceptors lined up when you get accepted. The reality is that you have to start looking for preceptors at least 1 year before you start clinical rotations. The problem is that there are more NP students in need of preceptors than there are available preceptors and some preceptors have students lined up to train maybe a year in advance either arranged by the school or the student doing the arrangement themselves. My program (blended online/onsite) required us to find our own preceptors and they wanted us to submit a preceptors name a semester in advance so they could vet them and make sure that they were an appropriate preceptor for a primary care experience.

No my change heart about women's health did not set me back at all. My program required us to do at least 40 hrs in women's health during a semester we had to complete a total of 180 adult primary care clinical hours (Gyn only). So I did 50 and moved on. If I had more interest in women's health I probably would have done more hours during my last semester which my school allowed you to do specialty hours as long as you 500 primary care hours were done.

I'm a new AGNP. I graduated last May, but I started at my current and first NP position 5 months ago. I work inpatient at a hospital on the Endocrinology Service. We only see adults for everything metabolic/ gland-related from out of control diabetes to high calcium levels to adrenal insufficiency. Very interesting field and I am learning a lot. I don't regret doing AGNP vs FNP because I really had no interest in doing peds. At one time ( before I went to NP school) I thought I wanted to work in women's health, but after my women's health clinical rotation during my NP program, I realized I did not want to look at lady partss all day everyday. So the AGNP program gave me that luxury, that I would only have to do that role sometimes if I work in primary care.

Have you tried your state NP association? They usually have preceptor lists. Can you have MDs precept you? If so do you have any MDs that you know or are friendly with? How much help do your school give you? I know my program was little to no help unless you were close to the professors.

As a NP I don't do blood draws or IV starts but I know FNPs who worked in the ICU who may have to draw blood sometimes or do arterial sticks if no one can find a vein for blood. I know one of my preceptors did draw blood if his RN was out for the day. However it is not a job requirement and you need blood from someone or iv access there is usually someone around who can do it.

I'm not sure the boards are that easy given the multiple number of post on allnurses alone of people fail the exams multiple times. Granted I can't speak to someone's knowledge base, if they are currently a practicing as a RN, just not great test takers, if they intelligent or just book smart. I know very smart people who did very well in their NP programs and impressed their preceptors very much with their clinical knowledge who have not past this test on the first try.

Some people do it because it has been a struggle to get their foot in the door as a NP somewhere and are willing to go for broke with the first ( and maybe only) offer that comes along. Not the right thing to do but true for many.

The adult- Gero exam is new. The one being retired is the adult np exam ( the one without the Gero).

Some employers prefer ANCC certification mainly because it's been around longer. You have to find out what job prefers. AANP exam is strictly clinical multiple choice questions. ANCC is a mix between clinical, delegation, research and leadership questions - at least 60% of the questions are clinical. There are also different types of question - multiple choice, pictures, multiple-multiple answers, ranking question by priority. The reason why ANCC has more chances to retest than AANP is because ANCC has 3 versions of the test vs AANP has 2 versions.