Jeffthenurse

I've been teaching PN students for the past three years and I'm very proud of the graduates and what they've been able to accomplish after just a year in school. We have an 87% pass rate on the boards and most of the graduates have jobs in nursing. Hospitals are not hiring LPN's in the urban areas of NJ & PA but nursing homes and prisons are. But the writing is on the wall for my students mostly because of a study by Linda Aiken, RN, a Ph.D at the University of PA, who proved (by Dr Aiken and by others replicating her study) that patient outcomes were better if the nurse caring for patients had a BSN. She studied the charts of over 20,000 patients so it was a signficant study size. We've even lost some clinical sites because the hospitals decided to only have BSN students in their buildings and asked the LPN and AD programs to find other clinical sites. I strongly disagree with this practice but there wasn't much I could do; those places no longer hire LPN's and therefore felt they only wanted to teach BSN students because that's who they were looking to hire. I now tell my students to be the best LPN they can be but to look for an RN program ASAP after graduation. My school also now has an LPN to RN Bridge program to assist them in their educational endeavors.

In my experience as a nursing instructor I've found that the flunk-out rate among students who worked full time was very high. Every semester we warned students not to try to work full-time and go to school full-time and still they tried and most failed. I'd suggest that you attend a school part-time or try an online program where you can pace yourself without attempting to study without enough sleep. A lack of sleep combined with the distraction of a full-time job caught you in the end. I wish you good luck and success---don't give up your dream but don't make those mistakes again.

Shodobe, I'm neither a used car salesman nor a sales rep, I'm a Master's prepared RN with many years of staff, management, education, and home care experience who happens to have a radio show on a major Philadelphia, PA station. Actually, radio is an extension of my teaching career; instead of talking in front of 50 students at a time, I'm talking to thousands of people at a time. Many of my guests have been nurses.

No, I'm not trolling for anything. I've had this feeling about OR nurses for a long time and this site and Beth's article gave me an opportunity to voice my opinion. I'd rather see an educated, experienced nurse working in an area where she or he can use that education rather than in an area where anyone with only a high school education can do the job. Since I've never worked in an OR my perspective of the issue will be different from someone like Beth (the original poster). And I do have compassion for the patients. And yes, I have undergone surgery, and had my hand held by an OR nurse, and it was comforting. But it could have been done by an OR tech without an RN background.

I have been practicing nursing for over 33 years as a staff nurse, nursing supervisor, nurse manager, educator, preceptor for new nurses and/or students, clinical instructor, and health care sales rep, and all of these jobs entailed more than holding someone's hand or fetching NSS or D5W for the doctor! And yes, I am practicing now as a home care nurse which also entails more thought and expertise and critical-thinking than talking to a patient for less than 2 minutes. I went into broadcasting so I can highlight nurses' expertise and put nursing into a good light for a change. I've had many nurses on the show in the past 6 months, talking about a variety of topics. I believe that nurses in the operating room just highlights doctors feelings that nurses are just handmaidens and can be pushed around. That contributes to the overall feeling in this country that nurses are insignificant. Look at the assault rates in emergency rooms and on med-surg units. Physical violence directed at nurses is on the rise. There are many reasons for it and one of them is that nurses aren't respected. Maybe if nursing was dominated by male nurses it would be different. Maybe we should take over! Then we'll trade----operating room staff will not be nurses and hospital administrators will be nurses. That's a good deal....maybe we should look into it.

Thank you for a well written, informative, thorough article. I still feel however, that OR nurses are overqualified for the position. Any nurse would be overqualified. The patients are only in the OR for a short time, informed consent, NPO status, the chart, tests, have already been checked several times up on the unit, and "the nurse develops a rapport!!", yeah, for about 2 minutes! Most of the assessment part involves being a last second secretary. Diagnosis? The care plan has already been written up on the unit; education will be done on the unit----the patient isn't going to remember much about whatever you will teach them. ...."Holds the patient's hand to comfort them...", aaawww, you really need a BSN for that! I feel different about nurses in the recovery room. They're often Critical-Care nurses. I'm speaking from being a patient and from 33 years of nursing experience. It's just my opinion and I thank you again for your article. I plan to discuss this again on my radio show on an AM station in Philadelphia, PA in the future. I just never saw the need for a Registered Nurse in the operating room. Often, you're just a gofer.

You're talking about the CRNA Boards? Couldn't you take another course in another school and then retake the boards? Are your courses applicable to a Nurse Practitioner program? Do you have trouble taking tests? Won't your professors mentor you by giving you verbal tests? Don't quit! -Jeff

I worked for ATC several years ago and I thought they were a good company. They sent me to clinics, doctors' offices, insurance companies, and other alternative (non-hospital) settings because that's what I wanted. They also have hospitals and nursing homes if that's what you want.

Take care of yourself first! How could you work a 12 hour shift if you were in pain? Make it up to your manager by working an extra weekend or by working the next two holidays. You're a team-player, you should get some sympathy from your co-workers and manager. It's not like you hurt yourself on purpose.

Happy Chanukah and a Happy and Healthy New Year, too!

I've been hurt on the job before and reported any injury that caused continuous pain. If I was able to take two advils or tylenols in order to continue my shift and the pain went away, then I wouldn't report it but if the pain continued, I did. I was usually seen in the ER and followed up. I filled out the incident reports because I wanted the hospital to know there were unsafe areas and keeping it quiet wouldn't help anyone. Who knows, the next time it could be a patient who is hurt. Hospitals are fearful that employees will attempt to stretch out their workers' comp benefits and stay out of work longer than is warranted. There are employees who do cheat. My employers were always interested in me getting the help I needed so I could return to work quickly. If you don't report injuries, how will your facility know if your environment is a safe one?

I flunked Fundamentals of Nursing, took a semester off and worked as a nurses' aide, then returned to school and earned my BSN. Later I earned an MN (Master of Nursing). Take a few deep breaths, then go talk to your instructors and the Dean and see if you can work out something. If they say no at least you'll know it was more than the one-tenth of a point that caused you to fail. I've taught nursing and when a student was in danger of failing a course, we (instructor group) would meet with that student early in that semester and work out a plan to help them pass. We also did that for clinical. We wanted to avoid the "surprise--you failed!" shock that you and I experienced. My problem was in clinical and my instructor was right. I had "two left feet" and was disorganized. I vowed that I would NEVER do to any of my students what my instructor did to me. I'm surprised your instructors didn't sit you down and go over what you needed to do to pass. They owe you an apology for that.

I think the reason that it can be difficult to work with some women these days is because of all the sexual abuse they had to put up with for so long. I'm careful now about the jokes I tell but I haven't lost my sense of humor and I can usually find a patient or a female colleague willing to hear a joke. I don't repeat foul, dirty jokes. So what if a female colleague asks suggestive questions about a man's body parts? I would consider it a compliment but would change the subject. You have to respect their rights and they have to respect yours. I don't worry over charges of sexual harrassment....I'm confident in my abilities as a nurse and I think I can convince any jury of my innocence of the charges and make the plaintiff look really stupid and incompetent, along with any supervisor who sided with her in the process.

I had two friends who worked there several years ago, one male and one female. There's no freedom of religion; if you're Jewish, they won't let you in the country. A female nurse won't have the same privileges as a man----can't rent a car, can't go out in the heat in short sleeves or shorts (you'd be stoned to death off the US Compound), and all letters are read by the "authorities", both incoming and outgoing. My friend told me to be careful about what I wrote and I could tell that the letters he sent were opened and then taped closed. Some sentences were actually either blacked out or cut out! Women are treated about the same as a cow or a donkey. My female friend basically stayed on the US Compound for the whole year she was there. Travel is difficult, Riyadh is far from other capitals and you can't go to Israel and then return to Saudi Arabia, so you can forget about visiting Jerusalem or other sites in the Holy Land. I understand your reasons for wanting to earn $200,000 tax-free but why would you want to go to a country where the freedoms you're used to, like speech, travel, ability to congregate, and religion, will be taken away? There are other travel nursing opportunities in this world where you'll be welcomed and well-paid, and wll have the same rights and freedoms that you have in the USA.