raynbabe07

Thanks everyone for your advice. Suit it is! :) Can't wait!

So I landed an interview at my dream hospital here in Chico, in Med/Neuro, and am so so excited!! I work at 2:30pm on the day of the interview, which is scheduled for 1pm. The lady on the phone (I think it was the nurse manager but not sure..) said "since you work at 230, just come in scrubs!" I said "Are you sure??" She said yeah, of course! All I've ever heard is that interviewing in scrubs is a big no-no, and I can easily change into my scrubs in the restroom after the interview if I do decide to wear a suit. What do you guys think?? Should I go ahead and wear scrubs since she told me to, or wear a suit anyway? Thanks!

I am getting 7 shifts with the treatment nurse (I will be working pm's where I will have to do some of the treatments after she leaves at 430pm), and 3 weeks (12 shifts) with the PM charge nurse, which is what my position is. I am soo thankful for this much training! When I interviewed the DON told me I would get 10-12 days training, and I'm actually getting a lot more, which is amazing! The other job I was offered was only going to give me 2 days.. so glad I chose this place instead. It seems like such a supportive group of staff, and everyone I've met is super nice. The nurses always look so calm and collected, and always take their lunch breaks and get out on time. No wonder this place is a 5 star place.

No, it is for-profit, and there are multiple locations around California.

I did get offered a position for the other facility, but I chose the 5 star one, and am SO glad I did! From the moment I accepted the offer, everyone has been so welcoming and nice. The DON seemed super excited when I called back accepted the offer. A short while later I got a call from the Administrator welcoming me to the facility and saying that the DON was the nicest lady ever, and I was lucky to have her as my manager. Everyone I've been introduced to seems very friendly, and I've heard lots of comments from family members thanking staff for taking such good care of their family. And it was only my 2nd day today! I'm still nervous to have so many patients, but I feel like I will get really good training and have lots of support once I am on my own. :)

Thanks for your reply! I think the patient ratio of the place I was offered a job scares me.. 37 patients, versus 23. But hey, low staff turn-over does say a lot about the place. Why would people stay in a crappy facility? Ugh I just didn't know what to say when I was offered the job since I was still waiting on the other one. I've never been put in that position before! Would it be okay to call back and say that I will take the job if they are able to up the hourly rate a little? Maybe $27/hr? Or is that a bad idea? I do still prefer the other job, even though as you say, it may look nice from the outside but not be great at all.. but I dont want to risk losing one job because of waiting on another one that I am not even guaranteed to get! I think I'm going to just wait until tomorrow and if I still haven't heard from the 2nd job, I'll accept the offer from the 1st.

So here is my situation: I applied to two positions, and had interviews for both yesterday. We'll just call them Job A and Job B. Job A has great Medicare reviews (5 starts), while Job B doesn't (1 star), which is why at FIRST I thought I would prefer Job A. BUT after going to the interviews, I actually like job B better. The facility is nicer/newer, there are only 1-2 patients/room, the staff bring their dogs to work, and each unit has 2 nurses and 4 CNA's for about 45 patients. (So only about 22-23 pts/RN) They also start at $28/hr, with a $1500 sign on bonus. There would only be a 3-4 day orientation. OH and it is also 1/2 post-acute rehab so there would be lot more variety and short-term patients which would allow me to do more skills than just LTC. Job A has one RN per unit, which is 37 residents, with 3 CNA's. It is an older facility, and there are 3-4 patients per room. During the interview the only question she asked me was "how do you handle stress?" The rest of the time she just asked if I had any questions. She did say the staff all got along great, and there was very low staff turnover for both CNA's and RN's. She would give me a 10-12 day orientation. The starting rate their is $26.20/hr. My dilemma is.. I just got offered a job at Job A. I told her I was still waiting to hear back from another facility I interviewed for. She sounded kind of disappointed, and said she wanted to start training someone ASAP (like tomorrow) so that they would be ready by Feb 1st. Job B said they would get back to me by Monday, but I called today and left a message with the DON and asked if they could give me an answer sooner because of my job offer at the other place. Still waiting to hear back from her.. What do I do?? If job B doesn't get back to me by today or tomorrow, the Job A might go with someone else, and I don't want to lose the job offer, but what if I don't even get offered a position with Job B? Is it okay to ask job A for a higher hourly rate? I've never worked in a SNF before, and have only worked as an RN for 2.5 months in a non-hospital job, so I don't know how to compare quality of SNF's... Thanks for your help!

Hi SunRayRN! My husband and I also recently relocated to Chico, from Southern CA. I graduated nursing school in May and got hired here last month at a pediatric daycare facility. We might actually need another RN, so maybe you could try applying to my work in the meantime? I am also trying to get a job at Enloe or Feather River, with no luck so far. We should meet up sometime, as I also don't know anyone else in the area.

This New Grad Care Partner program is open again, and starting in September. I already completed the assessment test and preliminary interview, which went really well! The next step would be a panel interview, with 5-6 directors of nursing. I am very hopeful that I could start my career at Corona Regional. I graduated from a school in northern CA and recently moved to Corona to be closer to family, and this is just perfect for me! I am still in shock that this could really happen. They are hiring 6 new grads now, and last year they hired 30. They say that no one is guaranteed to move up to an RN spot, but all 30 new grads were found RN positions last year. You do have to be a CNA for 3-4 months, but that is SO worth it to me if it means I will most likely be an RN there by the end of the year. I have applied to lots of other RN jobs around here and this is the first one that I've actually heard anything from. Has anyone else interviewed for these positions?

Starfish- I actually found another program that I like better, IVHQ, that goes to Guatamala and am 95% sure that is where I want to go now. Im even more sure now after hearing how much you loved it! What program did you go with? Did you get to do a lot of hands on stuff even though you were not an RN? Like give injections? Any suggestions for where to travel while we're there? Thanks for the info!

Thanks for your answers, its good to hear that you both had such great experiences! I am so excited and hope it will open my eyes to another culture and get some real hands-on experience.

A group of girls in my nursing program are seriously considering going for a 6 week volunteer trip to Honduras this summer. We would be working in a health clinic/hospital in an underserved area. There is a program called Volunteering Solutions, which is the cheapest we've found. It includes housing with a local family, and 3 meals a day. There are lots of testimonials on their website, but I was just wondering if any of you have done something like this, and how was your experience?

Yep, same here! We haven't had any tests yet, but I feel like I really need to get organized and find some sort of routine. I just feel overwhelmed just looking over the syllabus with all the reading and stuff we need to know in so little time. We only have 4 tests each semester so the first one will have a TON of info on it! We have a competency tomorrow on vital signs, so I've taken my poor husbands bp a million times and still don't feel too confident about it..

I start August 16th! I've already bought all my books and uniforms and all I need now are all the fun school supplies like pens, notebooks, etc! I can't wait to start!!!

I was also accepted for Fall 2010!!! I'll email you guys that are accepted so we can talk before! And Lee701, what orientation are you talking about? As far as I know, the TEAS test is on June 24th and the orientation is July 14th.. Rayna