MentalKlarity

You accepted a week of vacation a year? Wow

It's not your fault, because NP education is failing us. Many people assume "all schools are equal" because we trust the nursing boards to only accredit programs that prepare us to work in clinical practice. That is not the case. The reality is that the "requirements" for accreditation from our boards are a joke, which is how programs like U Phoenix, Walden, and Chamberlain (who together graduate 10s of thousands of NPs per year) are able to accept 100% of applicants, teach using discussion board postings, and let people set up their own clinical. Add into that how pitiful the clinical hours are for NPs (around 500 hours in the program where PA programs have 4x that and MD programs have about 8x that + residency) and you can see they DO NOT prepare most NPs for practice. The only way to be truly prepared as you can be is to: 1. Go to a not for profit program, preferably an in person or "hybrid" program. A for-profit fully online program is a big red flag. 2. Make sure the program sets up your clinical. 3. If you already went to a poor program, fix the issue by going to a residency! Residency programs help NPs transition from school to practice and can "iron out the kinks" in the pitiful holes in NP education for those who went to crappy programs. At this point if you feel underprepared, I highly recommend seeing if you can find a residency program. There are hundreds, they pay a normal salary most of the time, and really function as a "job" with a lot more teaching and handholding until you get the hang of it.

Sorry do you mean 1 week of paid vacation or you can only take 1 week of per year? Because if the latter, I'd run from both of those jobs as that as absolutely not enough time off per year and you will be basically working nonstop. That's not even enough for holidays let alone taking vacations/trips?

Don't take anything at Phoenix. Likely to have some random admin who uses pre canned teaching modules and has you learn pharm by doing discussion board postings. Seen as a For profit diploma mill style school.

Look at Frontier and state schools like Eastern Kentucky. All more reputable than chamberlain. This school is an absolute joke and it's an embarrassment that you'd even consider it. Anyone who goes to these for profit joke schools are a completely embarrassment to the profession and I wouldn't let them treat my worst enemy.

What state are you in? I will tell you good programs to look into. Your previous RN experience means little in making medical decisions, it's a different part of your brain.

If you're basically saying "I don't have enough time right now to fully focus on learning how to be a medical provider so please give me the easy way out" maybe you should not become an NP right now. That's not a dig, but this is about learning to take care of lives. This attitude of "Hey I will take whatever easy program I can find because I'm busy" is why other medical providers laugh at us. NP school isn't supposed to be convenient.

We do exactly the same as the MDs. The MDs are my colleagues and we see the exact same patients, treat exactly the same way, bounce ideas and plans off of each other. I cannot tell the difference between the NPs and MDs at my organization.

LOL no. Going to a program because it's convenient is a major red flag. You're training to be a medical provider. Physicians spend years doing pre-reqs, 4 years doing difficult school in person, and years of 80+ hour week residencies and you have NPs that think they should have equal standing but can't even be bothered to go to a real school? Because taking entrance tests or doing an interview or taking hard classes beyond discussions boards from adjunct professors is so much to ask? People from Walden and other for profits don't deserve to have equal rights to MDs, and they drag down our profession.

100% agree. The number one thing we can do is STOP precepting or hiring for profit students and grads until they get the message and this mess ends.

You're correct, but I think the issue is more there needs to be SOME barrier to NP entry. It's not experience, it's not GRE scores, it's not certain weed-out classes (organic chem), it's not even admissions itself (since Walden/Phoenix, etc take 100% of applicants). We all just wish there was SOMETHING giving some selectivity to our profession.

It's actually not cheap. It cost a lot more than a local legit state NP Program 99% of the time. It's a rip off. It's for uneducated consumers who fall for scams. I wouldn't see an NP who went to Walden or Phoenix because their choice of school tells me all I need to know about their judgement

I mean Walden is literally just pre packaged modules I'm not even sure what students pay for. The professors are adjunct, they find their own sites, the classes are pre packaged discussion board postings, and the degree is embarrassing and a joke. Why would anyone go there

Because the accrediting bodies are likely just a bunch of money hungry greedy admins who see more nurse practitioners as more test money and more money from dues.

Important to add to this the different calculus. For nurses, they are REQUIRED for the hospital to run. They need X nurses for the hospital. You've seen hospital bills? Hospitals that are for profit will pay whatever they need for RNs to keep those numbers flowing. A night in the hospital can cosy $5,000. Times that by 10 patients on a floor you have $50K in one night. Paying 2 nurses $1500 to keep them alive = pennies on the dollar for the profit. For providers, the calculus is different. You only make what you see. A new grad FNP might see 12 new patients in a day. They get maybe $100 per patient from insurance. This is $1200. Account for people who no show or don't pay their bill or insurance scrapes it back, down to $1000. Now add in the facility and other staff. Even giving the NP HALF the profit, thats $400-500 a day. Now down the line when they are experienced and can see 25 patients a day, they may deserve a much higher pay. But as a slow new grad, an NP is not "generating" the money yet to cover their salary + a profit at $200K+. So why do physicians start higher? They did residency, they can swoop in and start with that 20-25 patients day 1. And they get higher insurance reimbursement rates. And can bill for procedures the NP cannot do. The MD did residency for 4-5 years making $50K a year while they learned the ropes. The NP is still coming out ahead making $120K as a new grad doing the same.