boyfactory

I have worked in 3 different Emergency Departments in Tennessee and Georgia over the last 9 years. I have never been given a differential for working in a "Critical Care" area. My cousin, who works in Southern California, claims to receive a $5 differential there. I am curious if the differential is a regional thing or not. At the facilities where I've been a registered nurse is a registered nurse as far as pay, regardless of diploma, ADN, or BSN.

The pay, from what I have seen is pretty low in the Atlanta area. With 8 years experience, I was offered between $24.60 - $28.80 at area hospitals. The shift diffs are the killer difference here though. They are much lower than I have seen in 3 other states.

This is exactly how it is where I work. It works well when we have a float nurse to help with the critical patients. Or checking in the ambulance patients. I've been a nurse 7+ years and cannot imagine 10 patients of mixed/possible ICU/SDU condition. Unsafe, no question.

Be honest about your lack of ER experience, but tie in the things you've done previously in the ICU that you will bring to the position. Dealing with critically ill patients and their grieving families, etc. Most of all, show them you are willing to learn!

I have used a butterfly a few times with a syringe for medication administration. They are perfectly usable for short-term medication administration (less than 2 hours). IM is fine for some things, but if the med was ordered iv and you don't want to start a line, butterflies are fine. Keep in mind, some dosages are different from IV vs IM...like toradol.

I spend between 4 - 8 hours per week. I do read the chapters because they are not long and they are informative. However, my TA is driving me crazy. She sends emails that say things like use what I have noted about your work on the following week to improve your grade. Well, I do not even get my grades from her until Saturdays, when things are due. It is crazy. I emailed and was told, I grade things in the order received. Well, I wait until I get my grades back. They come on Saturday, every time. No winning.

My TA is a very hard grader. Not sure if this TA is going to be around for the summer or not. I think either Prof would be a doable class to double up with, less this TA.

Good luck to those attempting to test out! I read the whole book, did the online study materials, and got a B+. It was well worth taking that grade to test out.

Glad to know the final will be that way too. I took the midterm before your post. I had studied the Cengage stuff religiously. Then, in the parking lot, I looked at the quizzes in the book. I am so glad I did! I would have missed many more.

I'm a bit concerned because the midterm and final are each worth 1/3 of the grade. Does anyone know if the tests are curved? It's worrisome that I may get everything done and have this class keep me from graduating.

It is official, Prof P's class...or just my TA...is making this class less than enjoyable. I find the topics difficult to write about. The grades from my memos are not posted until Friday or even Saturday of the following week. The quizzes are only worth 5 points each. Hopefully, that is enough to keep my grade in the A range...but I doubt it. If only this were a 5 week class instead of a 10 week class because I am ready for it to be done!

I just submitted the QSEN paper and am now done with NRSE 455! Too bad I still have another 5 weeks of Nutrition and Business Comp to go...

I have never had any problem allowing the JW population allowing me to obtain blood. That is new to me. I did once have a young girl with a hct of 9 that flat out refused blood products and would only take fluids.

My old one was on a computer that died. I guess I will be starting from scratch. It will be nice to have it done though.

I did better than week 1, but I had to beg for my grade. In fact, I sent an email about 1am on Saturday morning requesting it so I could fix any errors I had duplicated on the Week 3 assignment. I got an email later in the morning notifying me that the grade was in. It should NOT take until Saturday, the day the next memo is due to receive a grade! I am at least grateful my grade was better this time around. But, it would have been nice to know on Wednesday instead.