everlasting

I am interested in working as a CNA during Nursing school. I can only work on the weekends, so I've been going some job hunting. I found a job opening that is PRN; weekend days. This may be a stupid question, but how exactly does scheduling work for someone who works PRN? Would I have a schedule in advance or would I just be on call? Any help would be greatly appreciated! :)

You can't use "I've been sick" as an excuse forever, you know. Your excuse for not doing the project was "I was sick?" Really? We've known about the project since the FIRST day of class and it's worth 25% of our grade. You've been sick for a week, not for a couple months. I'm even more shocked that you turned your project in three days later. Just so you know, it was due THREE DAYS AGO! You have no sense of time. You are at least 30 minutes late EVERY day. And when you finally decide to show up, stop announcing to the whole class why you were late. Just so you know, we don't care WHY you were late. And your story about the long line at Starbucks sounded so dreadful. Maybe next time, skip the coffee and get to class on BEFORE it starts! You really didn't bring a pencil to our exam. Where have you been all semester? We have been taking paper tests since the beginning of class and every exam day you never have a pencil. And no, you may not borrow mine. Would it kill you not to slam the door as you leave when you've finished your exam? There are about 30 other people in the class and we would love to not be scared out of our minds by the door slamming every five minutes. It's also distracting and extremely annoying. Must you ask EVERY week where we're going to be for clinical? I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but we have this thing called a calendar and it has numbers and words on it. It tells you when things are due and where clinical is going to be every week. Print it off please.

It takes me about 30 minutes to get to campus. Both clinical sites (hospitals) are about 5 minutes away from the main campus, so it only takes about 35 minutes to get to clinical from my house.

Oh my wow, please stop talking! It wouldn't be so bad if you had something constructive to say but you can talk about nothing for hours! You could talk about the color blue the whole clinical day. I've never met someone who talks as much as you do. It's exhausting and it's getting to the point where no one listens to you because you've become background noise. Just. Stop. Talking. Your scrubs are beyond wrinkly. It looks like you wadded them up while they were still wet and threw them in the corner for a week. Iron them please. I'm surprised you haven't been sent home yet for this. I can't believe you called one of the students and told her that you weren't going to make it to clinical because your car wouldn't start. It's not her responsibility to tell the instructor. It's yours. Our clinical instructor gave you her phone number for a reason. If you lost it, then call the hospital! Don't call one of us.

Just because you use to be an EMT doesn't mean you know everything about nursing. Stop interrupting the teacher to chime in "Oh I did that as a paramedic" or "One time, as a paramedic..." Just Stop. Please. Why can't you ever be on time? I can't believe you asked "Are identical twins always the same sex?" during our OB lecture. The key word there is IDENTICAL. lol. Do you have to restate everything the instructor says as a question? Instructor: "Patients on Coumadin therapy should avoid Vitamin K." Student: *raises hand* "Okay, so, Vitamin K shouldn't be avoided by a person on Coumadin?" Seriously, she JUST said that.

What really helps me is to record the lectures. Once I record them, I upload them onto the computer, print out the power point, and take notes as I go. If I miss something important, I can just rewind and play it again. I've even put the lectures on a CD and played them in my car. I have a 30+ minute drive to campus and clinical, so it's perfect to play them during your drive. I read the chapter(s) before lecture, print off the power point that accompanies the lectures, and then during class, take notes on the power point. It really helps me to read before going to lecture. That way, everything you go over in class is like a review. I also really like flashcards. They've always worked well for me. Some people hate them, but I think they really help. I think they work well when studying different types of drugs. I make drug cards with the drug name on one side, and then the drug class, side effects, dosage, etc on the other. I do a lot of NCLEX questions as well.

I can't believe you actually answered your phone and said to the person who called you "No, I'm not busy. What's up?" In the MIDDLE of lecture! I know how much you enjoy texting, but next time, please turn the key volume off because all I hear is beep, beep, beep, beep. Ugh. It's distracting! Or better yet, leave the room to text! Please. When we are going over the test, stop debating the answers with the instructor! You got the question wrong. Accept it and move on. If you want to debate it, see her after class. Don't waste our time. Since you're the "all knowing" why don't you teach the class? I really don't understand why you get so upset when you fail an exam and yet you told me you didn't study. And you're shocked you didn't pass it? Study next time!

At my school, acceptance letters are sent out first, followed by alternate letters and then denial letters are last. We've had people called the first day of class because someone dropped or never showed up. I couldn't imagine having such short notice. I need time to prepare!

I'm in the same situation! We started on a new curriculum, so my class is the last one on the old curriculum. If we fail a class, we usually could wait a semester or two and retake it. Now, if we fail, we're done. We would have to reapply, and go through the whole process again. It is BEYOND stressful! We weren't told until August, when we started the program, and it was too late to back out.

We lost quite a few people because of the dosage calculation exam. You had to make a 90% to pass and you got one retake. There was one girl who hid flash cards in the pocket of her hoodie so she could use them to cheat during the exam. She got caught and was kicked out. We had certain skills we had to pass off at the end of the semester. There were quite a few people who failed because they couldn't pass off the skills - BP's gave people the most trouble.

We lost the a lot of students during Fundamentals. I'm in MedSurg I/OB now, and I have a feeling we will lose a lot after this semester. OB is notorious for being the weeding out class.

^This. I wasn't responding to your post. I was referring to someone in my clinical group. Sorry for the confusion! :)

- You have a never ending supply of black pens. - You are always broke. Always. - When your idea of fun is going to Wal-Mart and buying flash cards in every color. - When you first meet someone and tell them you're in nursing school, they tell you their entire medical history and what medications they are taking, and if I believe the medications are effective. (True story! haha.) -You travel with a BP cuff and stethoscope in your car because people are always asking you to take their blood pressure.

I really don't think it's the best idea to say every cuss word under the sun in front of your patient. If you mess up, or drop something, stop acknowledging it with a bunch of profanity. You come across as really unprofessional. To the people who sit behind me in lecture, please STOP talking! If you're going to talk bad about the instructor, make sure she's not standing a few feet away from you when you do. She can hear every word your saying.

I hate doing care plans and IPR's! I also hate how disorganized everything is. There is a girl in my class who was told she was in PEDS this rotation, bought her books, and went to clinic on the first day, then was told that she'd been switched to OB that morning. Ugh. It's happened to more than one person too.

I realized that I remember information better if I hear it, so what I do is read the book out loud to myself. I also record the lectures and play them back and take notes as I go. Also read all of the assigned reading before going to class and have some questions ready to ask if you don't understand something. I also love using flashcards to learn terminology. And a good NCLEX book that's divided up into subjects is beyond helpful. A good way to tell if you understand and learn the information, is to teach it to someone else. It helps me to ramble on forever to my mom about a particular subject and have her ask me questions. It helps me realize what I know really well and what I need to work on. Hope this helps! :)

Last semester, I HATED clinical. I really disliked the hospital and my CI. I had a very degrading and horrible CI. We were belittled the entire semester and could never ask her questions with her going off on us. It wasn't a good experience. Honestly, class was a complete waste of time and money. I'd have to choose class over clinical. This semester, I like clinical a LOT better. My CI is awesome. She's super helpful and wants us to ask questions if we don't understand something. We're at a different hospital, which I love. Class has gotten a bit better but it's still a waste of time most days. This semester goes to clinical. :)

You never stop talking. You're extremely distracting and I don't care to hear about "how drunk you're going to get this weekend" in the middle of lecture. Okay? So stop! Stop acting like you know everything! If you already know everything, then why are you here? Stop making me feel stupid because I put a different answer on a test. You go on and on about why your answer is right and makes the most sense and completely tune out the reasoning behind other answers. I do laugh a little inside when I find out the answer you were so adamantly sure was right, was in fact, wrong. It proves that you don't know EVERYTHING. Why do you wipe down your chair, desk, books, doorknobs, people, markers... absolutely EVERYTHING with Lysol wipes? I don't understand. How do you function in clinical? You can't go around wiping down everything and everyone with Lysol wipes there, so how do you survive? Don't just sit there when your phone rings, and rings, and rings some more. ANSWER IT or turn it off. We all know whose phone it is, and sitting there all nonchalant like a statue isn't fooling anyone. I promise that you will survive if you get on the elevator. I know how you think it's an incubator, but I'm sure that if you just try it, that you will come out alive.

- when preparing the patients lunch tray, the patient says "I can't have these greens." student nurse says "Why not?" And the patient replied "Because I'm on Coumadin!" - ask our instructor "A condom catheter? What's that? How does it work?" - look at EVERY patients chart on the floor and leave the charts open and visible for everyone to see. - call your husband in the middle of class and talk LOUDLY about personal things that NO one should know and fail to notice the instructors about to kill you. - ask me "How do I chart my assessment?" after we've been in clinical's for 13 weeks!

My clinical started the first week in. It was a bit intimidating at first, but it will give us a good 16 weeks of clinical practice. When I got my acceptance letter in the mail, the date and time for the orientation were included within the packet of information I was sent. Hope this helps!

I officially started last week, but it was all orientation. This week we are actually getting into the material. Everything is overwhelming and intimidating. We jump right into clinical! I have my first real clinical on Thursday, and I am scared to death! I have no idea what to expect and I really don't want my CI to bite my head off. We will be doing baths and occupied beds in clinic because that's what we learned this week in lab. Hopefully, my CNA clinical experience will help me out? Overall, I'm excited!

I always use index cards in assorted colors. I'm in Pharmacology & Fundamentals now, so if we're studying cardiovascular meds and respiratory meds I'll put all of the info about cardiovascular meds on green index cards and respiratory on blue. It just helps me keep everything organized. Plus, if I wanted to study the cardiovascular meds more, I can just pull out all the green index cards, instead of digging through hundreds of cards trying to find the right ones! I also rewrite the powerpoints onto notecards and add any additional information for clarification. It can take a while to do this, but writing something out really helps me remember things. Another good idea is to use the CD's that come in the back of the textbooks! These have a bunch of practice tests you can take on each chapter. The CD's really help me really get a feel for how the questions are set up and quiz me on what I've studied at the same time.

I think it's a good idea to have designated colors for different professions. I know at most hospitals around here, all RN's are in navy or a combination of navy/white. CNA's are in green, respiratory techs in maroon, etc. We have never had difficulty distinguishing the RN's from the CNA's and vice versa. However, at the nursing home that my grandmother is at, you can wear whatever color/pattern of scrubs that you want. I've found it really hard to figure out who the RN's are because everyone is wearing different colors. Also, I don't think professionalism comes only by how you dress. You could be wearing the best outfit and be dressed to the nines, but if you don't act like a professional, then you won't be treated like one. It goes the other way as well. I think if you're just wearing plain navy scrubs, but you act in a professional manner, then people will see you as professional. I didn't read through all the posts, so I hope I'm not on repeat. :)

My first official day of Nursing school was yesterday. Everything went relatively well. We just went over the syllabus and talked about our clinical assignments. (We have clinical the FIRST week of school). While we were going over the syllabus, the girl behind me actually had the guts to take out her cell phone and call someone. I could hear every word she was saying and she wasn't being discrete about it either! The instructor stopped lecturing/talking and basically chewed her out in front of everyone. I can't believe she actually did that. I mean seriously, we all know not to call someone in the middle of class, especially in Nursing school?! The sad thing was, she wasn't sorry about it. She kept back talking the instructors and interrupting them the entire time. I was shocked. I can't believe how much textbooks were! It was seriously insane and a rip off. The instructors seem to be nice and helpful, for the exception of one, but overall, they're nice. It was a good day overall! =D

Our uniforms are realllllly old. They haven't changed them in who knows how long. We have to wear a white polo with our college's name on it, a hideous white vest to wear over the polo shirt, lovely white scrub pants, and a long white jacket. The worst part is that we have to buy the old timey Nursing caps. It's white with green trim and barely fits on our heads, so we slightly resemble Aladdin. Thank goodness we don't have to wear the caps to clinicals, just to pinning! Oh and we have the option to buy a white skirt instead of regular scrub pants, but I don't think anyone will go for that.