Rook

As a member of the Class of 2011 I'm going to assume that you are 20-21 years old. Well, I got news for ya fella, those "some people" are right. Once you hit drinking age then there is no going back from those life choices that you made all of 12 months ago. Who's going to hire an over the hill 25 year old new grad RN? Obviously I'm kidding and I also graduated with a BSN at 35. Since the ecomony tanked Nursing schools are hypercompetive (even in Community colleges - too many students not enough professors) so get good grades and the firefighter exp doesn't hurt. Paramedics, not sure though, its a tough job and IMO would be a fun rewarding job. However the only paramedics who make living wages are the ones who work as employees of big cities. Getting in with the city govt probably isn't easy with budget cuts/recession etc.

Saudi Arabia and/or other rich Middle Eastern countries might take you as a new grad. Here in the United States we're closed (we still have a shortage but have decided to tackle the problem head-on by not hiring anyone; especially new grads). I think the only way in would be to stop by the embassy and enter the immigrant lottery. That being said we do have military bases all over the world (a huge one in Germany) that always need civilian health care workers and if Germany doesn't float your boat I'm sure Afganistan is nice this time of the year. Canada might be an option however you have fly to canada to take the boards.

Why Hopkins? Those hospital rankings are bunk. They only have meaning if you have a one in a million rare disease or if you are rich and/or famous. The only Baltimore hospital I know that hires new grads is Sinai. They are currently building a new Peds hospital too so there might be openings. Even if you can't get peds its easy to transfer to any dept after a year or so.

My hospital hires new grads in the ED, CICU and ICU or they did until the budgets cuts came. If you can't get ICU right away go to Intermediate care for a year. You'll need a few years to get into CRNA school anyway.

Just don't go somewhere where you'd graduate with 60-80K in debt when you could somewhere for 20K and probably get a better edcuation. In MD Hopkins has one of the worst NCLEX pass rates and they you pay 40K/year for the privledge of failing it. Nobody hires you on the fact that you went to a famous school. Where I graduated at Salisbury Univ in MD has a good accelerated program (3.3K/semester as a MD resident you get residency if you agree to work in MD). Its only 3 semesters and had a 100% pass rate for 3 straight years (not sure about the Fall 2010 class grads). Its hard to get an A there (the best students get 3.5s they try to only give A's to about 10-20% of students) however as a balance if you are a SU grad you automatically get into the masters/RN practiconer program with a 2.75. The only downside to the program is that while the campus is nice the town is a dump and because its so accelerated (the 1st semester is cake) you get punished in the final semester.

Trop and myoglobin levels used to get diluted out at a lot of hosp in the 90s. Trop can easily go over >1000 as you are measuring nanograms of the substance. However, a troponin >1000 isn't any more clinically significant than a >100. It just means that you have a bad MI (and if it needs to be diluted, then the result will take longer to get back to the floor). Myoglobins are also reported out as >1000 at many hospitals, and they could go over 300,000 in crush injuries.

I'm a chem/hematology lab tech and a RN. CK-MBs aren't considered a good cardiac marker anymore and many hospitals including the one I work at don't use them anymore. AST and LH are also considered to not be good cardiac markers as well. If you are thinking its an error though do a redraw. The machines are almost always accurate however cardiac markers can have a error if you use serum tubes to collect them (I don't know why many hosp collect card markers in serum tubes) and the patient is on heparin and/or other anticoagulants. Because even after sitting for 1hr you could get a fibrin clot in the serum and sometimes the machine doesn't flag it during sampling.

GF works at Sheppard Pratt. Its a decent hosp. 8hr shifts only. Extremely busy in the AM, night shift is pretty dead from what I hear. She works PRN though (gets as many hrs as she wants) and she said that she would never work full time there through because they really screw full time workers scheduling wise. Sometimes they'll hire PRN workers without exp if you want to try it.

As long as you have a year under your belt in exp you'll be fine in that respect. Getting a visa is tough in this climate now though. Job openings are scarce. However you might have a shot getting a job in DC or North VA its one of the better markets for RN hires. question: my bro lives in canada and was thinking of taking the Canadian NCLEX. Does Canada pay well, and is a visa hard to come by to work there?

1.5 yr exp. 36hrs/week. I usually work one OT day/month as well to cover my car payment. Could probably work 48 or 60 every week if I wanted to but I don't.

Salisbury University in MD is much much cheaper ($3500/sem instate - $7500/OOS), and only 3 semesters. I think the 2nd degrees have passed the NCLEX 1st time at 100% for the past few years running as well. SU administration also doesn't look into residency real well so even if you live outside of MD you might be able to get away w. instate tuition. 2 of my friends were from NY and Maine and b/c they already had an apt there for say a couple months before school they got residency. Its a good program there though admittedly the last semester is hell on earth and the town of Salisbury is a garbage dump. They don't pass out A's like candy there like some schools as well. The best students usually finish with about a 3.3-3.5. However any student with a BSN and a 2.75+ avg automatically gets into the graduate or NP program is they so choose which now is a good thing to think about given the scarcity of new grad jobs.

No quotas. The bias is experience. My supervisor was telling me about our last job opening. She had 42 applicants for 1 job most of the applicants being new grads and a couple who had experience. She was throughly unimpressed with the experienced RNs and did not want to hire any of them. However because they had exp she had to do all kind of extra work (about 2 days worth of meetings/paperwork) to justify hiring a new grad. Just take the 1st job (unless its psych and you have no interest in being a psych RN) you get offered. Right now no matter what your GPA is you are limited until you get that all important 1st year under your belt. Think of it as your final year of RN school. For regions that are hiring: I think Texas's ecomomy hasn't blown up, and I think the market in DC is also decent for new grads but that's all I can think of.

All the time as well. Of course the majority of them have demensia. I've experienced both extremes. I've always looked young for my age. 12 years ago when I was a medical technologist, I worked in a dialysis unit and one of my jobs was recruiting study patients. A couple weeks into the job the MD in charge of the study told me that all the patients thought I was doing a high school science project so she bought me a lab coat.

When looking at accelerated RN programs I looked at the Univ of Pittsburgh, discovered it was 30K/year and promptly went to the univ. closer to my home Salisbury University of MD. Its a decent school and was 6600/yr for tuition 3 semesters only.accel BN grads have a 100 percent 1st time NCLEX pass rate for the past 3 years.

Sinai $25 After 7pm $2 Weekend $1? Shore Memorial Hosp (not hiring) Easton $23.50 Eve 10 percent Night 15percent Weekend 8percent Sheppard Pratt $26? unsure about diff Union (in 09) $24 All of MD is pretty much in $23-28 range