shenderson314

Its only been 3 years since I've been out of active duty but I remember my recruiter having a harder time getting OB nurses than med-surg for NTP. In fact I could have received orders sooner if I chose OB. Again, maybe things have quickly changed. I had a friend that did med-surg and was able to switch to OB in less than a year. It all depends on your command. All the command at the time had nurse training in OB so I'm sure that helped.

I just started my first job at LTC facility because hospitals around me are not hiring. I decided to broaden my horizon so I applied to nursing homes, doctors offices, etc. So far it's quite a challenge for me. I am a charge nurse on nights. I am in charge of 60 pts and 3-4 CNA's. I'm still in orientation and I'm learning a lot about these places since I never had a taste of them in nursing school. I'm flying solo after 10 days orientation...scary! I'm grateful for the experienced CNA's that work for me however I feel it's strange for a new grad to be a charge nurse right off the bat. I'm being optimistic about this and going to try my best until I leave for the Air Force.

I have just taken on this position and I found this post. I'm totally new to this. I graduated in novemeber and this is my first job ever as nurse. I work night shift so I will be all by myself after this week and have 4 CNA's under me. What have you learned to become an effective charge nurse?

Hi! I was wondering who is hiring in MO. I live in St. Louis and have applied to many places such as hospitals, nursing homes, and doctor offices and I'm not getting a replies. I want a med/surg position which one would think would be easier to get. Unfortunately I'm in a bind in relocating but I guess I might have too...I have plans of leaving for the Air Force in October but who knows if that will happen because I was planning on leaving this month or May at the latest. I graduated nursing school in novemeber and the only experience I have is my tech/secretary experience from working at a hospital for a few years. HELP!

wonderful! You will do great! Also, whenever you schedule it, take the date off the day before the exam and enjoy yourself. Everyone I talked to in my class did this before they took the exam and have been passing. Do not study up until this exam because it is really hard study for this thing. Just relax and do thing totally NON-nclex related. Don't even study before you go to exam site. I even heard the brightest of the bright in my class admit this was a difficult test and you can only do questions and much as you can...you just never know what kind of questions you will get. Best of luck the rest of your schooling!

I've battled tests that require critical thinking skills since I started nursing school. My GPA plummeted but I never failed a class by the grace of God. I finally got a little better my last year. So if you feel you are a bad test taker, i know where you are coming from. I was able to pass the nclex the first time with 77 questions. I studied for 5 weeks. I took a week off right after school was over. then studied 3-6 hours a day, 5-6 days a week. I would do at least 100 questions a day. I only used saunder's and mosby's questions and I also had a kaplan box of medications I'd thumb through. I had boxes of question cards by saunders and mosby so I would carry cards with me when I was working. The only book I had was saunders if I needed to look up something, any more material I would have been overwelmed. Good luck!

when i passed 75 questions I was ready to expect the worst and was ready for another 10 questions. When it shut off at 77 is when I felt like I was gonna throw up. i was a wreck waiting for my results thank goodness I passed!

That's how I studied using saunders and I passed with 77 questions. I noticed sometimes I got a lot of repeat questions while I studied even in study mode but it helped reinforce the information. Also, there's only so many ways they could possibly ask you a question...you know?

I think Saunders has a great series. I agree with all the previous posts and just do questions and read the rationales. You have a lot of knowledge being a CNA and EMT so I'm sure you will be fine. The test does not have nursing theory questions as that time of stuff is not covered in an Associated program. You kind of look at books at the store and check out what you feel like using. I personally loved the saunders book and i also purchased the saunders q & a cards so I could carry a stack with me when I was working. A couple of friends I know used NCLEX incredibly easy Q & A. A lady I babysit for is from England. She did nursing there and moved here and had to take the nclex. She did Kaplan because she had no idea what content to study and testing was totally different here. Good luck and it's wonderful you have so much support!

I actually just graduated from GSON BJCON and had a pretty good experience. I'm sorry to here that some people say it's the worst ever. It doesn't matter what nursing school you go to, there's always something wrong. It can feel like the school is a business but colleges are a business. There are some great teachers and there are some bad teachers because they do not know how to balance teaching classes and working on their disertations because they require all teachers to continue their education. We do a lot of clinicals and all my clinical instructors have been great. We have a great NCLEX passing rate right now and students from other schools such as UMSL are transferring since we seem to have a good reputation.

I just graduated from an BSN program and our clincials were much like the LPN program's day on the floor. We started doing clinicals the last week of our fundamental's class but it was just to get our feet wet in a hospital and do the care of a tech. In med-surg I took care of just one patient along with the nurse assigned and by end of the semester some of us were taking care of two patients which is actually a lot better. Peds, OB, and Psych were a little different clinicals for me because it was more just assessments. It was more an observation. Med-surg II was much like the first although we were in more critical areas and took on more patients. We took care of 3-4 patients along with their assigned nurses. If you have to fill out any paperwork prior to clinical, plan on taking a lot of time doing at least the first time around. We had to come up to the hosptial the night before to write out their dx, hx, meds, etc which took me a few hours. That was due the morning of, then the care plan was due a couple days later. It really helps if you have a good instructor. I was luckily to mostly very good clinical instructors. good luck!

Avoid St.Anthony's Medical Center. I've worked there 3 years in different places and it never got better. I would try to apply in the BJC network. You have to have time to train though if you want to be a patient care tech. You'll learn alot but you have to commit some time to it. patient care techs usually start around $8.50 with no experience at the places i've been. A secretary at the hospital is great too because you learn all the lingo and how to take orders. They tend to pay their secretaries more too. St. Anthony's started at 9.00.

My goal in every group I'm in is to make sure the class stays awake. My favorite project is when I did a game show, just like you said. You may have found them already, but I used a Smarter than a 5th grader template for powerpoint. We plugged in questions then we wrote out a script with celebrity contestants. It was fun!

I take the HESI after each semester when i'm done with clinical rotations. I just finished taking one for psych and one for women's health. I found it useful to ONLY use the HESI book because numbers are different in other NCLEX books and you may learn slightly different things in classes you take. The HESI hints are good to go over and also doing the problems on the CD are great as well. The HESI test was rough to get through for me. I think it's great you want to get a jump start on test-taking practice for the HESI. I wish I had.