sierranic

Get one of those NCLEX-PN review books. Saunders is a really good one. This will really help you understand the format of some of the test questions you may get in class, as well as why that answer is correct. Nursing test questions are much more different than any other test you may take, try to remember that when you get a test question to pick the "best answer" not always what answer looks right, because most test questions may have all four answers that are correct to the given situation. My teachers used alot of questions that were really similar to the questions that were in our study guides and reviewing the material before a test really helps with your understanding on certain subjects.

Ummmm... I'm not ...... Yet! :) I took out max on student loans, and qualified for grants (which really helped) Alot of the Hospitals around my area will pay back some of your loans once your employed, so that will also cut back on my future payments. But as of right now, I'm not paying a cent...... In the future, well that's a different story

I'd have to say the 3 y/o boy

What did you do after graduation but prior to boards to prepare yourself for the exam? If you studied from the review books, on average how many questions did you do each day and for how long? Thanks

Our school required a physical and once I got into the office I got very upset. I assumed with this being a health care program that I would only have to answer some questions and possibly prove that I can lift, push, and pull heavy objects. However, I swear this was no normal physical and I voiced this to the NP that was doing my exam. She checked everything, reflexes, hearing, vision. The thing that upset me the most was that she said I also had to have a breast exam!! I was furious, I couldn't understand why I wouldn't be capable of being a nurse if I had a lump in my breast... I couldn't believe that this was required as part of the physicial, I told the NP that I felt like this was something my school did not need to know!! And the NP stated that they also wanted to do a pap test, but she somehow talked them out of requiring it!! WHAT IN THE HECK!!! It was unbelievable what they HAVE to know before you enter the program that I did! But I did it, and it still baffels me to this day... I'm just glad that I got through my course, and don't have to go through that again!!

I had one of those "weed em' out" teachers and most students lasted the first 10 weeks of this semester and then the teacher turned evil :angryfire We lost about 5 out of 25 students within a 2 week period, it was pretty rough. One student was dropped because she left the med cart unattended 10 feet away from her, with a staff of 10 watching it from other parts of the hall (I think it was just the point of leaving it unattended). Another student was dropped for not checking HR before administering a Beta-blocker, another student was dropped for giving meds to the wrong patient, another was (I'm not too sure) but it had something to do with "the pt bled alot". I thought I overheard someone say he was on a Heparin gtt and blood was in the foley, but the student didn't report it. And the last student I have no clue. I do know that my instructor bluntly told another student that "she was an incompetent nurse". But I THANK GOD that I made it though that semester, cause I really, really didn't want to go through that again!!! :balloons:

- By second semester you realize that the three alarm clocks you had are no longer waking you up, so you go out and buy two more! - Your dinnerware now consists of plastic silverware, plates, bowel, and cups! - You can't remember the color of your carpet.... cause you can't see it, you can't afford the 5 min it takes to vaccum - You seriously look into and apply at other colleges.... just in case you fail! - You no longer buy white socks with colored stripes for your spouse... you buy all white... because you don't have time to pick through the basket for their mate.... or you just leave them unmated and throw them in a drawer, or leave them in the basket - You start teaching your children at the age of 1, how to do the dishes, laundry and cleaning - After graduating, you finally get started on the spring cleaning from 2+ years ago. - You get a 78% on a test and scream with Joy!! - You leave clinical, sniffing yourself, wondering if you smell like the hospital

It sounds like you have yourself in the perfect position to make a move! My recommendation would be to see if it would be possible to shadow a nurse and see how you would like it. Over 50K a year is a big some of money to be giving up if you aren't 100% sure your ready to go into another field

You may be stressing yourself out. I once went through this after having two children, I was a day late and almost had a breakdown, I wasn't ready for #3 to come yet. I stressed myself out so much "Thinking I was". I went and bought two tests both came up negative, Still I was upset because it wasn't for another week till I started. I was on the patch and had quit a few months prior to this happening, and everything was fine those first few months, but for some reason the third and fourth month were really off the calender!! I would say that you may be stressing yourself out, hoping to be pregnant

Welcome Zigs!!! I'm here in Council Bluffs, hoping to get into the ADN program here at Iowa Western...... However, I have also applied to Southwestern in Creston and Iowa Tech in Denison just in case.... Still have to wait to see where for sure it is that I'm going (hopefully Fall 04') Nice to see you here!!

I took A&P I last semester and I loved it!!! I'm currently taking A&P II. All of our labs were taken at home on the computer with lab simulating software. We averaged 1 lab everyweek and 1 quiz every two weeks (which were timed). Our Midterm and Final had to be proctored, so I had to go to my local CC and take them there. But other than that I didn't seem to have any problems with the class. I love online classes - if I could do them all that way I would!! (I don't want to pay for daycare, and lectures and labs can sometimes be really boring IMO). As long as you read your book and study the most important information you should do fine!! Good luck!

Cb is right, And for your last response to my "Why go to college", I was refering to the fact that you can walk into quite a few businesses around my metro area with no college education and start out making more then a RN would.... Yes maybe in the long run.... years later you would come out on top, but then again, maybe you wouldn't... It's a gamble. That was just one hopital though, and I know there are many different locations where I could work and make more... I was just stating the fact that one of our major hospitals here doesn't pay nurses the wages they deserve.

I forgot to add this in the last post, but a hospital close to me offers the student nurse internship, which pays $10/hr and once you graduate you get $1/hr for every hour you worked as a student and your base pay as a GN goes to $11/hr...... Which I can't understand why they wouldn't pay you more than that.... It makes no sense... But I guess that's corporate America for ya!! This is what it says on the web site.... XXXX's are the Hospital's name!! Don't know if I should state which one it is!! ================================ Senior Student Nurse Tech Position Participants need to have completed their junior year in a qualified nursing curriculum. The Senior Student Nurse Tech will need to work a total of 48 hours per quarter to maintain their position. If they accept an RN position within xxxxxxxx upon graduation, they will be paid retroactively with passing state boards - $1.00 per hour worked as a Senior Student Nurse Tech. Starting Salary - $10/hour New Graduate Senior Student Nurse Tech Positions For Senior Student Nurse Tech who are employed with xxxxxxx post graduation, but prior to successful completion of the RN-NCLEX exam there is an increase in salary for the Senior Student Nurse Tech. Upon successful completion of the boards the Senior Student Nurse Tech will move into a new graduate RN position and salary of $11.00/ hour. ========================

No, it was RN, and to top that off the LPN's make only a few less than that.... Kinda makes you wonder why you would go to school longer for only a few $$.

I live in Iowa, so I can't answer for MD, however we are not offered free CNA classes here. In order to take one you need to pay out of pocket, or be employed by a nursing home or LTC facility (they pay the cost). Maybe you can look around and see if you can work at a LTC and get your classes paid for. Otherwise, here in IA you can challange the boards, if you already have CNA under your belt then you could do that and skip the class all together, would still cost you some money, but alot less then what you would pay with the class and state testing. Hope that helps you!!!

I took the test just two days ago, there were no science questions. But there was a passage that you would read regarding scientific stuff, but all the information is there that you need so no science background is really neccesary. The biggest part of the test was the math - 60 questions in 60 min - what you don't get done counts against you and you don't know how much time you have left unless you happened to look at a clock before you started. I was able to finish it fine, but for some people that might be a little rough. Also the last section (which I still don't understand) gives you some really confusing test-taking questions that made absolutly no sense!! Overall I did well, ranked in the 99th percentile - but for my test-taking skills it listed me as "frustrated" - and I would say for that part yes I was.... for anyone who has taken it, you'll understand!!!

33 out of 35 here = 94% I wish I knew of this before I took the NET test, seems like it was similar in a way!!

From what I have seen, I think RN's get paid less in my state then most of the others. I am not a nurse, hope to be someday!! But I do have a friend that works at the hospital and she stated that they hire RN's at $15.57/hr starting out. I am also told that hospitals have a tendency to pay less then other locations, but searching at some of the local hospitals to work, I think we have 8-10 within 20 miles of me, the most I have seen was in the $16/hr range and the lowest was in the $14/hr range. The sad thing is that I currently have a job that pays more then what some nurses start out at, and my job didn't require a degree..... Go figure....

Here in Iowa you can actually challange the boards (No need to sit in class or clinical) If you are in school for LPN then I'm sure you would do fine challanging the boards. Our local CC offers state testing every Tues and Thur for $100 (last year, don't know about this year). Also if you work for a Nursing Home they will pay for everything including the class if you decide to take it, but it must be done within 3 months of hire. If I were you, I would check with your local CC, they should offer the CNA course as a continuing education credit, if not then check with your local hospital, they may have info on where you can find a state testing location. Good Luck!!

You wouldn't need to be accepted at a school in order to see if you are eligable for government grants or loans. I do believe that you have to be enrolled in a program for a scholarship though. Any government grants and loans would be issued on the basis of your family income, so if your husband is the bread winner it would be based off of his income. What you might want to do is start applying for school, so you know if you can get in. Some schools have waitlists that can last 2 years or more, so getting in may be the hardest thing you face. There are quite a few scholarships, loans and grants that are available, but personally I wouldn't worry too much. Some hospitals will even pay back some of your loans, so there is another option!! Whatever you do, don't give up!!

I believe it all starts at the educational level!! If there is such a shortage then the government should see to it that anyone who wants to be a nurse should have the opprotunity to be one. Rather than only picking out select students that the institution sees fit for their program. The government should step in and see to it that there are more programs available to accompany the many students who want to enter the field. At my school we have over 300-400 applicants and only 64 seats. Wouldn't it make sense to offer more seats to get more nurses trained? But then again, I can see if we did offer it to everyone, then some nurses would never be able to find a job because of the overload of nurses available on the job market. But they could atleast offer a few more students the opprotunity to get their education rather than telling them they don't fit their student profile and turn them away.... We could be shutting the door on some really good nurses... But that's just my opinion!!

What is the question your asking? Are you asking what % they pay? For the most part, if they are using medicaid, medicaid would pick up the majority of the bill. I believe the % the patient would pay would depend on what they get for their SSI, then I think it goes on a sliding fee scale of what their actual total costs are outta pocket. Hope that helps.

Hello everyone here in Iowa, I live here in Council Bluffs, and hope to attend IWCC Fall of 04', That is of course if they like me :) I am a mother of 2 (1 & 3) and a wife to 1! After next semester I will only be one class away from a Associates degree in Biology, my first intentions were to do something in research..... However after the birth of my last child I fell in love with nursing, while on maternity leave I searched the WWW to find out exactally what specialties nursing offers (I used to work for a health insurance company doing customer service) While researching I found out that a nurse can be a CRNA!! (EXCITMENT on my part) when I was in high school I wanted to be an anesthesiologist because I loved Chem/Bio anything with science and math, but I didn't want to devote 12 years of my life and $$$(debt) to go to school before making any $$$ so I put that off.... After realizing 10 years later that CRNA's do the work that I actually thought Anesthesiologist do I have started to pursue my dream!! I have all my pre-req's done, my CNA license, all I need is my next 6+ years of nursing education (I hope it doesn't take that long)!! But wish me luck..... On top of someday becoming a CRNA I'd like to look into travel nursing, so I can go to different countries (France in particular) I love different cultures!!! But that's pretty much where I am at now at this point in my life!! I wish everyone luck in the dreams the pursue!!

Are there any nurses or students out there that became pregnant while in nursing school? My problem is, that I feel that I'm getting up there in age and at some point in time I'd like to have 2 more children (already have 2) but I'm going to be in school for the next 6 years and I really don't want to wait until then to have my next 2. I was just wondering if anyone has went through this, and maybe what happened with school, do they make you sit out the semester that your due? Or do you quailfy for some type of major health event and if you miss a few clinicals you'll still be fine... See there's another problem, I will be having a repeat C-sec if I ever do have another, so I know I wouldn't be able to rush right back to class 3 days after birth... If anyone knows, or has been through this, please let me know what your experience was like with school/clinical!! Thanks

I also looked into going to a tech school vs a cc or univ for my LPN, the cost was 16k vs 4k at the cc (Big difference in $$$ for a student) However, I was very interested because the tech school started new classes every 10 weeks, and there was no selection process, so I knew I'd get in there quick, vs the CC which has selection 9 month prior to the start date etc, etc, etc...... But before I was going to commit myself to 16k in debt I asked the local CC what they thought about taking LPN's from the tech school for the LPN to RN course. The Head of Directors from the CC stated that they would accept anyone who was a licensed LPN regardless where they went, but she also stated that I should look into the school a little more closely before accepting it. Come to find out, after talking to the tech school, I would pay my 16k and walk out with a LPN, but if I were to transfer to a LPN to RN program I'd have to retake the Anatomy & Physiology, Microbiology, so on and so on because those credits don't transfer... So yet again, I would not only pay the 16k for my LPN but I'd have to retake these classes again, paying again, before I could enter the LPN to RN, whereas if I went to the CC I wouldn't have to waste my time doing this. So in my own opinion, I choose to wait it out, In the mean time I have been taking a majority of my BSN non nursing courses because I have all my non-nursing courses for the RN done. Then eventually I'll get in to a CC at some time hopefully fall of 04' but just incase I applied at another CC which will guarantee me a seat in fall 05'....... So look into it real good before dishing out all the money. There was another thing to which someone stated previously, their pass rates at my tech school were not all that great, my sister who is a nurse with BSN gets LPN from the tech school and complains up a storm about how she feels they don't know everything they should, whereas she feels like the CC and Univ LPN's have a little more knowledge...... Remeber this is your future, and only you can choose which route is best for you!! So best of luck to what ever you choose, just be smart and choose wisely!!