Living4HIM

North Carolina uses them

i agree. i'm an lpn in nc about to graduate adn next month. i have just accepted a job in tn and cannot believe the limits lpn's here have. i worked at mission hospitals in asheville, we did everything an rn did except the initial assessment and our discharge teaching had to be reviewed by an rn prior to dc. we had an iv team, but we flushed central lines, iv pushed central lines, administered blood and drew blood from central lines. we were iv certified at this facility and mistakes that we made would fall back on us. we have our own license and we work off of it and we are responsible. the rn was only responsible if they delegated to us something which was out of our scope, then we were responsible too. an extra note to the training, my training was better for lpn school than for rn and the lpn program was much more difficult at the same school, the rn program at least in nc is primarily the lpn program plus 2 semesters and a boatload of busy work. all lpn's should be proud of their accomplishments and their license because they sure worked for it and they deserve it. don't let someone put you down just because you are a "low paid nurse." i also worked in ltc and would have been happy to have 22 patients, there were nights that i came to work and had 72!! according to nc state law there is no limit on the amount of patients one nurse had in ltc and by the way it was night shift. 2 lpn's and 7 cna's, that's it. no rn on the premises. we all work very hard for our licenses and all should be proud. i am excited to get my rn and to be able to do all the same work that i was doing before, but to get paid more. actually, in east tn that's not true either. the pay is higher in wnc for lpn than in east tn for rn. we all do what we can and try to be the best nurse we can because eventually we all may be patients some day and we have to support eachother. good luck to you all and god bless!!