SIGMACHIGUY

why I wanted to work at UCLA, what I'll bring to the unit, where I've worked before, where I went to school, etc. Very normal stuff so just be yourself, smile, and show that you're enthusiastic and happy to be there and you'll be fine! :)

Hi chiklet, As for tips for your interview, I'm not sure what Liver/Tx asks but for my MICU interview they asked for normal/expected questions. Nothing crazy or grilling occurred. Just why I wanted to work at UCLA, what I'll bring to the unit, where I've worked before, where I went to school, etc. Very normal stuff so just be yourself, smile, and show that you're enthusiastic and happy to be there and you'll be fine! :)

I absolutely agree with all of these responses! It was more of a general question...I NEVER had the intent or slightest inclination to have that "I'm here for a 1 and am off to CRNA school after that year" attitude. Just as some have said, you never know what is going to happen. One might love ICU so much that they'd want to stay for several years before pursuing some other specialty and I'm all for that. I am a hard worker and while some others are laughing and reading magazines during our shift while others are continually working, I believe there's a lot to be learned from time management to building repoire with patients to helping restock the supply room even if it's not within your job description...or talking to doctors or looking some things up you weren't sure about during your shift. It never ends and it learning should be that way. I have every intent to learn as much as I can in the ICU and am super excited to start in a couple of weeks. I'll start with that and if CRNA school is still on my mind down the line, then so be it...but for now, my full focus is to learn as much as I can in the ICU. Though CRNA school may be the final destination, it's the journey that leads me there that matters most...:icon_roll

Thanks for your valuable feedback and positive words Cassandra!! I definitely agree with everything you said and you couldn't have put it more simply!! Great points and get perspectives...I definitely respect the role of an ICU nurse and being at a level 1 trauma hospital is an ENTIRELY different setting/environment that I am in now. I can easily see why anesthesia programs like the level 1 environment...I mean, the equipment, the acuity of the patient's, everything really...it demands so much more from you as a nurse. I will be starting in a few weeks and am very excited!! Thanks everyone for your feedback!!

Just 3 more posts!! haha~

Thanks for all that info, it really was helpful!! I still consider myself to definitely be a new grad especially to the ICU setting obviously so I am not surprised that I was off with some of my info. I was just actually wondering that the other day because the hiring department might have mentioned "liver transplant/surgical ICU" to me once or twice but everyone else termed it "liver transplant" ICU so I totally forgot that it was/may be the SICU as well. And I heard that the CTICU at UCLA has tons of its members leave for nurse anesthesia school as well, must be a great unit to work in. That was actually my 1st choice since I'm on a cardiac floor now but they didn't have any openings. Either way, I'm totally excited about working at UCLA...the research, academic, and teaching hospital that UCLA Medical Center platforms itself on is the perfect setting that I would LOVE to practice in!!

A little skill with a LOT of luck!! I'll take that any day of the week!!!

Thank you for your support and understanding...perhaps you are right but at the same time, there are so many benefits with being a CRNA at the same time. I'd dare say that those arrogant anesthesiologists who may think they are better than you are actually jealous of you at the same time. Jealous that they may not have the quality of life you do, jealous that you are accumulating financial freedom as they work hard to service their debt, jealous that you are able to do everything anesthesia-wise that they can but without all the years of school/stress/debt/time/sacrifices that they had to endure...yes, I dare say that some of them feel this way...

I appreciate your feedback and completely agree with you. There's just a lot of things going on in my mind right now so I hope you don't take it the wrong way...sort of a mid-life crisis if you will. I respect nursing and medicine for what they both are and have the utmost respect for EVERYONE in the healthcare setting. I'm just trying to find my nitch which has been the challenging part...at least I know that I'm meant to be in healthcare, just a matter of deciding where!!

Thanks everyone for your feedback, I really appreciate it!! I'm 99.9% sure...well 100% sure now that I'm going to take the position. I probably would have anyways because it's a large teaching hospital (UCLA Medical Center), level 1 trauma, and of course, being the challenge I am really looking for...an intensive care unit!! I'd go into ICU even if I wasn't going the nurse anesthesia route, just love the critical thinking aspect!! I just wasn't sure if you get the pressor, vasoactive, cardiac, etc. drips in the MICU since there is a cardio/thoracic ICU at the hospital as well. But from my interview, the cases the MICU sees a lot of are sepsis, acute respiratory failure, pulmonary htn, etc. And you guys are definitey right, I can always build on my ICU experience with MICU and later on decide if I want to transition to other ICUs as well even though I'm sure I'll be in the MICU for a while learning everything. I'm just super excited to have been offered the last spot for the residency program at UCLA in the MICU!! Thanks guys for all your feedback and thoughts about your MICU experience!!!

I was just wondering if MICU offers a good experience for a foundation in nurse anesthesia during your ICU requirement? I can potentially start in a MICU at a level 1 trauma center or I can try to wait for openings in the cardio-thoracic and/or neuro-trauma ICU units since they do not have any immediate openings right now. Thing is, I'm not sure when those openings will be available and when they would... I just want to make sure that MICU offers a good enough experience. Do you know if you get drips in the MICU? I was told that 60-70% of the patients are ventilated. Any thoughts or comments? Thanks everyone!! :bowingpur

I was initially interested in anesthesiology and was pursuing medical school until I met a CRNA one day. He told me about it so spent the next 3 years researching and reading about it and made the decision to pursue CRNA. I do like certain aspects of nursing but there are certain aspects that I am not in love with as well. This may sound weird, but I could never be a floor nurse and my whole intent of going through nursing school was to become a CRNA. If nurse anesthesia didn't exist, I would never have even gone to nursing school. Please do not get me wrong, I greatly enjoy patient care and interaction and I know that I'm in the process of becoming a great nurse but my real passion lies in the medical aspects of the science of caring for people. While most nurses are stronger in certain aspects such as flushing every hep lock, I'm more concerned and stronger in the patient picture and what is happening with them...their dx, their tx, their progress, etc. I'm back to being torn between nurse anesthesia and medical anesthesiology. So to answer the OP, I would have gone to medical school if CRNA's didn't exist. However, CRNA is a great way in reaching my ultimate goal in life and that is to provide competent and quality anesthesia management to patients in need...:icon_roll

MB73 put is PERFECTLY!!! I haven't decided yet but anesthesia just FASCINATES me. You are tasked with one of the biggest responsibilities ever in having a patient's life in your hands and you are required to make critical decisions regarding their anesthesia plan so I know anesthesia is where I belong. As for CRNA, every aspect that MB 37 mentioned is exactly how I feel... My confusion is whether I should pursue medical school and anesthesiology instead because of that looming cloud above my head that reads "What if?"...something I don't want when I'm 40 or 50 years old as a CRNA. Then again, from a financial perspective, CRNA makes a whole world of more sense than the medical route especially these days with our healthcare system...it's just a matter of how much financial strain is worth self fulfillment and I have yet to answer that just yet...when I do, that will be the day I am 100% committed on staying the CRNA route or opting for the medical school route instead...

I just graduated from nursing school in July, passed the NCLEX and started at a local hospital in their cardiac observation unit in September. It's not an intensive care unit but it's a step down and we do 3:1 drips. Two of my 3 patients yesterday were on a cardizem and dopamine drip...well, Bumex too but that doesn't count... Anyways, since I graduated this summer and am near Los Angeles, I really heard great things about the UCLA intensive care nurse residency program but since they weren't interviewing until now, I took my current job. So, being a relatively new grad, I interviewed with UCLA just a few days ago and from what I heard, it was pretty competitive. Cardio-thoracic and neuro/trauma ICU positions were all full so they weren't taking new grads for those units into their residency programs so I interviewed with the only two available: MICU and liver transplant. There was only one spot left for the MICU and nurse anesthesia adcoms would prefer MICU over liver transplant in my opinion so I was hoping to somehow get an offer for MICU but the director for that unit had the most interviews/applicants and one spot left for immediate hire. By the end of our interview, he offered me the spot!!! I was so stoked, it wasn't even funny!! So, I'm getting a tour of the unit and hospital next week and will most likey (99.99%) accept the position. Sorry to ramble on but to answer your question, I think it really depends on where you apply as a new grad. Community hospitals may be harder to get into because they arent' equipped with the proper training for new grads in ICU but at the same time, the competition isn't as rough if you can meet the right personnel at the hospital. Bigger/academic institutions have the resources to have great new grad ICU residency positions but as you can imagine, they are more competitive with more applicants but you will be getting grade A experience as opposed to small level 2/3 trauma community based hospital. From the local nurse anesthesia adcoms, they all recommended me to either do my ICU residency in at USC or UCLA. Hope this helps!

I feel the exact same way you do ever since I made the decision my senior year of college to pursue nurse anesthesia and I think we would be identical in our thoughts about being a CRNA. But, have you or did you ever question yourself in the entire process and wonder if you should've pursued medical school at all? I was pre-med with interest in anesthsiology just like you and made the decision to go with nurse anesthesia just like you so I'm wondering if you ever had thoughts about medical school as I am having now. I just graduated from nursing school over the summer and have been working on a cardiac floor for 2 months. And you cannot be more right in that nursing school, albeit learning a lot, was one of the most MIND-NUMBING things I've ever had to do. I graduated top of my class and felt like it wasn't enough of a challenge in many senses, thus sparking my thoughts about pursuing medical school now. Being an RN isn't much different though better than being a student nurse by far. I LOVE working with patients and helping them and I tell myself how grateful I am to walk into a hospital every morning I have a shift but I feel some of the activities are just busy work and on some levels mind-numbing. I'm assuming nurse anesthesia school is much different...at least I hope it is otherwise I'm definitely pursuing medical school. Did you ever feel this way at all?

quote] re: anyone ever have thoughts about going from pre-crna to medical anesthesiology? if you research this forum you will find that this has been discussed many times. i think that most people who are driven enough to attend anesthesia school have seriously considered medical school as another option. as one of my anesthesia professors said, "it is healthy to question if you really want to be here; i would consider unwise not to do so." i went through the same thing that you are going through about three years ago. i actually posted here: https://allnurses.com/forums/f16/crna...ns-102539.html and received some very good replies. long story short, i decided to stick with the nursing route and i started anesthesia school this fall. the major reason for my decision was based on my desired work/life balance. i am not willing to sacrifice eight years of my life to the pursuit of a medical degree. while i consider my professional career extremely important, i also realize that there is much more to life than what i do for a paycheck. there may be no right or wrong answer for you. you will be successful either way. sometimes it is good to step back and realize that at the end of the day, regardless of what letters are behind your name, you are still the same person. thank you for your thoughts, i appreciate it! and that link was great insight as well. and even though the crna route is extremely tempting and great, i just feel that i may have a cloud over my head of "what if" and/or regret if i were to stay on the crna route. something internal i guess but i can't help it. i have the utmost respect for both crnas and mdas and am in no way saying that being a crna would not make me happy, i just feel that even after all this time and researching/reading about all the wonderful things a career as a crna, there will always be that anesthesiologist who will be the team leader...of course at a great price. haven't exactly solved it...i'm going to give medical school a shot but at the same time i'm not going to sit around for 5 years if i can't get in. i'm just leaving my options open i guess...i feel so set on the md route then i ponder about the wonderful aspects that being a crna has which makes me unsure. a few hours later, i'm back on the md route...i guess this is the hardest decision i've ever had to make and i've done relentless research on the two routes of being an acp. and i know the differences, i just can't decide which is for me. i'm a well-rounded person and love to spend time with family and i have a hobbies which was the reason i chose nurse anesthesia 5-6 years ago but at the same time i feel like i'm a team leader and want to be an absolute expert in my specialty which leads me to the md route, one in which the sacrifices are great. but one thing i've learned is that no matter how hard or scary pursuing something may be, you have to be content and happy on the inside no matter how grueling the road is. and i'm fearful that the crna may make me wonder "what if"...so again, just trying to take in perspectives from both sides of the picture for now. what i mean is that the terminal degree in healthcare is md and of course medical school. if i go the md route, i feel like there won't be any regrets by going for it all as you would achieve the terminal degree. while pursuing an md degree is at a great price and sacrifice, there is no denying that it is the terminal degree in healthcare provision, so that's all i meant.

Hi everyone, So, I've been on the CRNA path for several years now...just graduated nursing school a few months ago and am working in a cardiac unit. I feel that I'm getting so close to my goal of applying and getting into a CRNA program in the next year or two but I've been asking myself if I should go for it all and apply to medical school and pursue medical anesthesiology before. I've registered for some classes at the local 4-years to renew my academia (I already have a BS in biochemistry and cell biology) and plan on studying for the MCAT within the next few months. I'm still not 100% sure though about medical school as I'm still pretty torn on what to do. So tentatively, I've made the decision to seriously consider medical school in achieving that terminal degree in healthcare. Just wondering if any of you CRNAs ever thought about or even are thinking about pursuing medical anesthesiology? I know of a CRNA who's been practicing for about 5 years now and he has just made the decision to apply to medical school so just wondering if there are any others like that. And if so, why? Thanks in advance for your feedback!! :icon_roll

So now that I've passed the NCLEX and am an official RN (), I am looking to apply to ICU units starting this week. I've heard cardio, thoracic, and trauma units are great ICU units to enroll into to satisfy the ICU requirement for nurse anesthesia but am not entirely sure. So I just had 2 questions: 1. Which ICU unit is best and most liked by admission committees when you apply to nurse anesthesia programs? 2. After looking at different ICU units in hospitals that I am applying to, I think I would love cardio-thoracic and trauma ICU's the most. Out of these 2, is there a better one to gain experience in? Thanks a million in advance for all your thoughts and advice everyone!!

So, I know there is that one year minimum ICU experience before actually starting a nurse anesthesia program given you are accepted into one but...when exactly can you start counting your ICU experience? I just passed the NCLEX and am applying to new graduate ICU programs and I know that these programs I am applying to have tons of class and clinical education before actually being on your own in the ICU (these new grad programs range anywhere between 3-5 months of preceptorship and didactic coursework). Sooooooo...if I were to start say October 1, does that mean my ICU experience starts October 1 as well? Or does it start from the day I am actually by myself which would probably be more like February 1 given I started October 1? Thanks in advance for your replies everyone!!

Thanks for the responses so far! I've had a struggle with this for the past few years while finishing nursing school. I was always the one to ask those crazy in-depth questions that other students would look at me for and many times professors couldn't answer. I think my dream is to become an anesthesiologist but given all considerations (and there are many factors...time, sacrifice, compensation, etc. etc. etc. just to name a few) I just am not entirely sure I can give enough of myself to pursue medical school. I've also always had a dream to become a professional athlete but I know that's not reasonable and I sort of feel the same way with becoming an anesthesiologist. I know I could do it but am not sure if the sacrifice is worth it when compared to pursuing nurse anesthesia. And I'm sure nurse anesthesia isn't a walk in the park either... Anyhow, thanks for your feedback!!

So yes, I believe the overall general consensus is to keep your mouth shut...which makes sense given what everyone is saying. No employer desires a short time employee especially when they may be investing a lot of money into you to begin with. Thanks for everyone's input!!

Thanks a million for all your responses everyone!! It's such a great feeling to be able to identify with others that were or are in the same boat as you! I'll definitely have to start calling some CRNA programs in the next few months to determine what exactly they weigh more and to see if I can get some feedback regarding my horrendous GPA and what their adcom thinks I should do to strengthen myself. I have no doubt in my mind about being a CRNA, that is the main reason I went into nursing in the first place. And even though I'd much rather not have to retake any more classes such as o-chem, I suppose I will if it really comes down to proving myself on the graduate course level which I would totally understand from an adcom's perspective. My overall GPA for undergrad is 2.62 and my science GPA was a detestable 2.40. I know that CRNA programs require at least a 3.0 and according my my prior calculations, with my 4.0 over a 2.5 year span during my ADN program...I believe that my overall combined GPA from both undergrad colleges is right around 3.2. Well, the journey continues I suppose...thanks again for all of your positive words and support everyone!!!

ICUnursetoCRNA: Nope, I moved back to LA and did my ADN at Moorpark College. CONGRATULATIONS on starting anesthesia!! Where are you going if you don't mind me asking? mikeyshox: I'm not planning on getting my BSN...unless I'm completely wrong, there are many programs that will accept a baccalaureate degree in the sciences which I have. At least that's what the schools said a year or two ago when I had called them so I'm planning on hopefully getting into a program with my BS in biochem...ADN programs might be at community colleges but I worked 100x harder than I thought I would've had to...definitely NOT cake walk at all. I had to bust my butt to pull of that 4.0!

Just wondering if anyone else on this forum had ever considered or even pursued medical school at any point in their life? And if so, why did you choose nursing over medical school? More specifically I guess, why CRNA route over anesthesiologist route? Just interested in hearing what everyone has to say...thanks for your feedback!!

Thanks a ton for all your feedback everyone!! I was thinking that I should probably re-take a couple of classes like o-chem since I didn't do so great. But I guess the real question I meant to ask was, do you think I can get into a nurse anesthesia program WITHOUT having to retake any classes or would that be nearly impossible? I feel that I'd be a strong candidate with the exception of my GPA...do you think other areas (i.e. BS Biochemistry/Cell Biology, good volunteer experience, many shadowing experiences with CRNAs, very strong letters of recommendation from unit manager/VPs of pharmaceutical companies I used to work for/CRNA/anesthesiologist/MD/etc., strong GRE score, strong ICU experience, etc. etc. etc.) could overcome a poor GPA without having to retake any classes? I just want to study anesthesia at this point and would definitley rather not have to focus on o-chem again and would much rather focus on gaining as much (strong) ICU experience as possible...what do ya think?