simvee

That's hardly fair. Whatever earlier disputes you guys have had here, I wasn't part of that. I just did a ten page concept analysis of the concept (apparently it's just a nursing concept) of independence. I had to define it, then identify antecedents (which I guess are requirements to have independence) and consequents (of having independence) - these are kind of covered in the definition, but I had to find several citations - any citations I could find were fine - in the nursing literature to back up this simple concept. Also, the citations can't be from anything older than 5 years, because independence apparently changed since then. We had to write a paper on the metaparadigms, which are, if I recall, the human being, the environment, the nurse, and....heck, what was number four? We're just making up and misusing terms. Like here's one of my favorite quotes: As Orem used terminology at various levels of abstraction within constituent theories, the reader is advised to thoroughly study SCDNT concepts, including the synonyms. For example, agency is also called capability, ability and/or power. I.....yeah. This isn't science. This isn't even good theorizing. Sorry, I know I'm just ********. I do very much like being a nurse, which is why I chose this track. But this is just nonsense to fluff up and justify academic doctoral positions, as far as I can figure, and the rest of us have to suffer through it or else the whole house of cards falls down.

Giving serious thought to switching to a PA program. They seriously cannot be as bad as this, can they? I feel being part of a medical program they just can't be as bad as a graduate level nursing program. I'm in the throes of Nursing Theory and it's killing me. This is such bogus, nonsensical, endless garbage. The textbooks are the most disorganized and poorly written I've ever seen. The teachers' writing is a little bit better. But I'm churning out papers that don't make any sense, yet getting A's. Everything has to have extensive citations back to the nursing literature, so I'm finding the most BS articles I can possibly stretch to cram into a citation in my papers. This isn't learning. This isn't science. Talk me out of it!

Thanks for all the helpful info, this is great. My question is do you foresee being able to work in an inpatient or hospital clinic setting? I was told our heart failure clinic (which is in our outpatient center, but on the hospital campus, and staffed by NPs who work outpatient and inpatient, sometimes in the same day) might not be eligible because it's not a generalized outpatient setting. But I think I'd like to work something like that. You said you had job offers - what kind are they? Will you be working under a family medicine doc in their clinic, something like that?

I too am curious about the Chicagoland area. Can we just use any family doctor? They said we could use MD or NP centers. My family doc had a NP student with him once, so I'm thinking of asking him.

I think I'm going to ride it out, evaluate other BSN programs, and evaluate other ways of paying. Even if I take out a small Stafford loan it wouldn't bankrupt me I guess. Of course taking out a loan for no financial compensation whatsoever stings a LITTLE. I asked my manager tonight about how our institution wanted us all to become BSNs but then pulled this. My manager's response, shaking her head a bit, was that our facility started hiring only BSNs as a way to eventually get rid of tuition benefits. Well, there ya go. I guess it helped them achieve Magnet status. Because I don't give a rat's ass about the BSN. My ADN was academically brutal and more than adequate for me to hit the floor running in a difficult urban Level 1 trauma center intensive care unit. They've been campaigning for years on how great it would be for us ADNs to get our BSNs because it boosts their image and helped them attain Magnet. I finally followed their advice, only to have this happen. I'm only doing the BSN to pursue possible advanced degrees, and the BSN is the easiest bachelor's I can obtain at this point.

I'm writing here seeking advice. I work for a large teaching Magnet facility which I really love. It used to (I'm sure still claims to) strongly encourage nursing education. I am an ADN RN who is in an RN to BSN program already. Recently I wrote about our hospital changed the status of 0.9 FTE nurses (three twelve hour shifts) to part time. I'm a 1.0 nurse, I fit an extra four hours at some point in the week, so this did not affect me personally. Existing 0.9ers were grandfathered in to some full time benefits. Well, I just got shafted today. All nurses are being reduced to 0.9 FTE status. This means: my health premiums will be higher and my benefits will be less. my vacation time will be reduced. my education reimbursement will be reduced from $4,000 a year to $1,000 a year. My manager recommended taking fewer classes to have less out of pocket expense but one grand pays for one college class. Or less. It's insane. Essentially, they pulled the rug out from under any ADN nurse who wants to become a BSN. Despite being a Magnet facility that harps on and on about how they encourage all their nurses should become BSNs and how BSNs produce better outcomes. What would you do? Find a new job? Take years to graduate? March to Human Resources and demand to be grandfathered? (As a side note, my manager asked me to become 1.0 to help out the unit. Then they immediately told me they "just found out" 1.0 people will not be grandfathered if they go back to 0.9. So I got screwed back then, as well.) Can I complain about this to Magnet or the ANCC? (That probably wouldn't accomplish anything at all, right?) Do you think they'll just start axing the ADN nurses next? I'm not putting anything past them anymore.

I've been reading many of the threads here re: tuition debt load, but I still feel compelled to ask - is anyone else in this situation? I'm speculating about CRNA school. I'm an ICU nurse with four years' experience. I have a mortgage (not much equity). We're a single income home and we have kids. Everything depends on me. I have no other debts - no car loan, no tuition debt (thank God ADN programs still exist), minimal credit cards. Probably entering an RN-BSN program this year so we're talking at least two years before entry. Living in the Chicago area, it looks like school costs between $50k to $78k. I would need cost of living loans, I'm sure, for at least one to two years. That would be, I don't really know - $50,000 a year? So I'm looking at $150,000 to $170,000 in student loan debt before graduation. Looking at loan calculators, paying off that much in ten years would be $1700 a month or more! That's a mortgage payment! An SRNA friend tells me that his school maintains their new grads earn about $170,000 in Chicago. I don't know if they're just feeding him a line. Honestly I don't know - is the investment worth it? It's scary with everything hinging on my income - to go without income for two years, and accumulate that much debt. I'm pretty certain, barring tragedy, I'd graduate. How's the job field looking in 2013? Chris

Our hospital just quietly transitioned to a new policy, wherein 0.9 FTE nurses (3 12 hour shifts) are not considered full-time. They reassure us that this policy only affects new nurses, and old 0.9ers will be grandfathered into full time. Of course, some of us just recently moved to 1.0 status because they asked us to​, so we're not happy that we can never go back to 0.9 without paying sky-high part-time insurance premiums! Has anyone else heard of this? They're insisting that the "0.9 = full time" thing was an incentive to attract nurses in a shortage. I think they're just lying. I thought the whole idea was that employers wanted nurses to go to 12 hour shifts (which nurses wanted as well) because it's financially better for the company, but the only way they could convince anyone to do that was to make three 12's count as full time. I think the take-home message here is "It's a bad economy, you're not going to find a job anywhere else, so eat it." Anyone else's thoughts? What's the history of this?

Do you guys find you have to work out just to stay fit enough to work? I'm finding work so much easier now that I've lost 25 pounds (due to other reasons - found out I had super high cholesterol). The lack of strain on my back is amazing. Now I find when I skip the gym for a week I feel the ache in my lower back again. I don't want to slip a disc or destroy my lumbar spine working with these big patients...! I've found it helps immensely with CPR, too. Personally I think chest compressions need a lot of physical endurance to be able to do them correctly. Any thoughts? They should have work fitness programs.

Yeah, I jog the stairs at work sometimes if I'm bored or need a pick-me-up. Sometimes with push-ups at the top and bottom flights.

Christ still takes 50 externs a summer as far as I know.

Working Class is expensive IMHO. Does anyone have any experience with Chicago Scrubs Outlet? http://www.chicagoscrubsoutlet.com/ Saw their good reviews on Yelp. Speaking of which, here's a Yelp search for ya: http://www.yelp.com/search?find_desc=scrubs&ns=1&find_loc=chicago+il

One of Masonic's sister Advocate hospitals has serial residency programs, like two a year. It's a new thing but I think Masonic's doing the same thing.

We insufflate just to have an idea, and then x-ray. Incidentally I have heard a wet gurgle on auscultation, only to have it in the bronchus apparently! So insufflation really isn't totally accurate, just mostly accurate.

I'm pretty sure when I was inserviced by the Roche Accuchek folks about using their machine, they said that one of the benefits was that I could use blood from any source, not just capillary (a fingerstick). So I can use blood from anywhere, right? I mean, I guess it would be laborious to draw from a PICC if you have to waste first, but it wouldn't be hard to get it off an art line rather than sticking a patient. Just a thought as I had to stick my patient for a fingerstick, their insulin, and SQ heparin, all in the same visit to the room. Another question: since heparin and insulin have Y-site compatability, what's the worst that would happen if I combined the two in a subcutaneous syringe and just gave one injection? Just a thought. I'm not going to start doing it, but it seems plausible to me.