goodgrief

honestly I never have anyone give cricoid pressure. it usually makes your view worse. it also decreases lower esophageal sphincter tone, I've seen several articles that are debunking the use of cricoid pressure so I don't do it anymore

you have them let go once you confirm placement of ETT. Gold standard for confirmation of ETT is ETCO2 (at least 3 waveforms), bilateral breath sounds, and visualization of fog in the tube on expiration

I read a statistic the other day that said only 27% of college grads have a job related to their major beyond 5 years of graduating. It seems like 5 years out of school is the magic number where people question their decision of careers. For me a job is a means to an end. I get it, you're sick of doing the same thing everyday, sick of the strong personalities in the OR, the call and weird hours, the sick patients who don't care about their health who have poorly managed medical conditions, dealing with PACU nurses, clipboard carrying nurses who come up with ridiculous policies that make no sense, being surrounded by 4 walls without windows all day, coming in to work when it's still dark and not leaving until after the sun has set and it's dark again, etc. I get it! I know money isn't everything, but tell me what other profession you can jump right into and make the amount of money you're making as a CRNA? The jobs are few and far between. Most likely what you need is a good hobby or vacation more, something to look forward to when you're not at work. I just figure my job is a job and it's what enables me to have the lifestyle that I want. I'm saving like a mad man, investing and trying to grow my wealth and live off of passive income alone so I can get out of the medical field as soon as I'm able. Until then, I'll continue passing gas for a very well-paying job, enjoying my hobbies, outside-of-work activities, vacations and watching my wealth grow.

Are you the anesthesia chuck norris?

I also had the same question and the reason I decided to become a CRNA and not a NP is b/c I wanted to stay hands on and in the clinical setting. It seems like most NP's follow a doctor around and enter orders and type up progress notes, no thank you.

You'll likely be accepted to whatever school you apply to depending on your GRE scores. Don't go to a different ICU especially if you're under contract, just focus on taking care of the sickest patients that are on your ICU. My suggestion when applying to schools: find a school with tuition that's as cheap as possible in a city that has lowest cost of living (paying back $200K of student loans sucks, even with a salary of $160K/year), also try to find a school with clinical sites mostly in the same area as your school within at most 1-1.5hr drive (with out of state clinical sites you'll eat costs of flying, hotel, etc), find a school with clinical sites that have autonomous CRNA's who aren't medically directed so you become an independent CRNA and most importantly an independent thinker

Your article basically only discussed how CC's are more flexible and cost effective. To me that translates into cheap tuition = low quality training. Plus your link mentioned only community colleges in general, it said NOTHING about nursing programs at community colleges. My link has ONLY nursing schools. I'd put my BSN program against your community college any day, I don't care which community college you're talking about, class by class and clinical rotation by clinical rotation, and my program would blow any out of the water, with hands-on experiences (didn't need my professor by my side to do things), with total clinical hours, amount of science required, etc. Did your nursing school have a cadaver lab? Did your nursing school have a high-fidelity sim lab? I took the exact same anatomy, physiology, pathophysiology, microbiology, organic chem, biochem as the pre-med and pre-dental students were required to take before ever being accepted into my nursing program. Like I said, I'd put my program against any community college's program ANY day.

the "master's programs" in this list are pretty much the same big name schools that are in the undergrad list that I just posted, see above

Best Nursing Schools in the US | CollegeAtlas.org grad school, undergrad, they're mostly the same. this link has a list of nursing schools rankings (non-grad school) my point is that no community college or get-me-thru-your-nursing-program-as-fast-as-possible school is listed here, it's the big name schools that are going to provide you with the best experiences.

here are the 2015 US News and World Report rankings of nursing schools Best Nursing School Rankings | Nursing Program Rankings | US News if you're complaining about how your nursing program didn't provide you with certain rotations, or you didn't get certain skill sets while in nursing school, look and see if your nursing school is on the top 100 list, I seriously doubt it is. all I have to say is that you only have yourself to blame for not fully researching the school you went to before going there.....should have chose your school better!

I can't believe these posts I'm reading.....nursing students who never started an IV, foley cath, NG tube, etc during nursing school? Shame on your schools and on you for choosing a school that you didn't thoroughly research before applying. I'm proud to say I'm a BYU graduate!! It's a phenomenal program!! I hit the ground running as a new grad nurse BECAUSE my nursing program prepared me to do so, prepared me to be an RN from day one. My 2nd to last semester we had an ICU course and did full rotations in the ICU, I did my capstone in ICU where I worked a regular RN's schedule for the entire semester; I had almost an entire year of ICU experience in my nursing program. I then took a job on a cardiothoracic ICU as a new grad.

there are no skills on a general ward that you can't also learn in a specialty unit

Age doesn't always mean that you're an experienced provider. I know many MDs/CRNAs that went to school MUCH later in life. You asked people not just to tell you, "Go for it," so I gave my honest opinion. In my post, I said that 77-year-old works on my OB floor, and he does fine, just as I'm sure you will do. Any school will accept you and gladly take your money. Whether or not you can get a job as a 63 y/o CRNA is a very different story, try to think of it from the point of view of the owners of anesthesia groups you'd be interviewing with, if they had 2-3 options for new grads (and they will b/c the CRNA market is becoming oversaturated), one or two that are 35ish and one that's 63, who do you think they'd go with? Likely the one that will cost them less money providing life insurance, health insurance, etc. Although at that point, a 63-year-old would soon qualify for Medicare, they may not need health insurance. One can also find a job that's 1099, straight cash, without benefits. Best of luck applying to school and, most importantly, getting through school; it will HONESTLY be one of the most challenging things you take on in your life in a genuine sense. And I know by experience!

Think of how a laboring OB patient would feel about some guy walking in all hunched over with back problems, possibly with a cane or a walker, and telling her he's going to place her epidural. We have a 77-year-old contractor that works on our OB floor, he does it fine I guess, but I can't imagine the look on the patient's face when he walks in their room, anesthesia is more or less a young man's game.

One clinical question they asked me was: A patient arrives to your SICU intubated, O2 sats are 75% with good waveform, what is the FIRST thing you do?