InkdBear

The Kitsap Penninsula is a beautiful place to live (and only a 50 minute ferry ride to downtown Seattle). Harrison Medical Center offers Seattle wages with housing costs 40%-60% less than Seattle proper. They have a nice variety a positions open on their website and they are doing really great things. Check them out!

Harrison Medical Center in Bremerton also offers a new grad residency program. In fact, they use the Versant Residency Program (they are 1 of only 2 hospitals in WA that offer it). It's highly structured, extremely supported and the new grads who participate in the program come out more confident and better prepared to work independently.

Two hospitals come to mind that have the best residency programs - Harrison Medical Center in Bremerton (just west of Seattle by ferry) and Overlake Hospital in Seattle. They both use the Versant Residency Program which has proven to be extremely successful. I believe they both have information about their programs online.

If you're not set on working in dowtown Seattle and would consider Kitsap County (West of Seattle), there are several staff RN positions at Harrison Medical Center that only require a minimum of 1 year experience. I hear they pay Seattle level wages, but the housing costs are 40%-60% less than Seattle.

Harrison Medical Center in Bremerton WA www.harrisonmedical.org also has a position posted for their Residency Program this year. Looks like they are also in need of LPN's who would like to work in their Urgent Care clinics. So if you are an LPN who can't find an RN position right away, you may still be able to get your foot in the door at a moderate sized acute care organization. Just a thought!

More and more healthcare organizations are using behaviorial based "surveys" to assist their managers fine tune the interviewing process. They are not supposed to be used as a screening tool. Most of these surveys do not have right or wrong answers and are good at detecting deception.

Harrison Medical Center in Bremerton is just a quick ferry ride from Seattle and is a non-profit community based hospital. The cost-of-living is significantly less in Kitsap county.