ETCO2

I don't know that you can resolve this since in most cases it is surgeon choice on which system they use for their procedure. You cant tell docs that they can only use Stryker or Depuy, or some other system. This may be more possible if the docs are employees of the hospital. But in most cases they are a group of their own that only uses the facility. Plus in my experience the vendor is the only one in the room who knows the details of the system being used. They direct the scrub, FA, and surgeon through all aspects of the procedure using their system. So unless a facility wants to purchase the system outright and find a way to have their scrubs/staff extensively trained in its use, the vendors are a necessity. It seems like it would be a tremendous cost savings to use a single system or vendor, but Capitalism!

Typically ortho and general handle the trauma. I personally don't find trauma all that exciting from a circulating nurse perspective. Its a lot of fetching and documenting work away from the surgical field. I would recommend you choose a specialty that you think you will enjoy overall, not just based on being involved in trauma. I am Ortho myself. It is loud fun loving rooms with younger hotshot doctors from my experience. It attracts a little more party crowd type person. Ortho room radios can usually be heard bumping TUPAC and Dre from down the hall. Neuro is for detail oriented people who don't mind hours and hours of near silence. Neuro docs in my experience are all kind of odd ducks though. CV is for those who want long extensive cases with a good chance of some sort of drama or complication. General is a mixed bag in my experience. Some young docs, and some very old docs and age does not determine in any way how easy they are to work with. I personally hate urology line, but the cases are generally quick and the docs are very self sufficient. Colorectal is gross, but the docs seem to be pretty laid back. Maxillofacial/ENT docs are usually some of the nicest docs I have ever worked with. Next in terms of comfort of working environment would be plastics. They are typically not in any rush since they know their cases are going to take forever anyway. Whatever specialty you choose learn to scrub! Its a very welcome change to perpetual circulating, even if you just end up holding retractors or a camera. I started by scrubbing only ortho cases, but quickly branched out to include other service lines. It is far more interesting than circulating. But be aware that a nurse who can circulate and scrub in an environment where RN scrub is optional will almost definitely be worked hard, likely abused! That being said im going to give you my perspective on one thing..... I went into OR after having worked ER, Cath Lab, and Vascular Access. Prior to becoming an RN I was an anesthesia tech and Paramedic. When I meet or train new grad nurses who want to do OR as their first job I caution them about the possible ramifications of choosing that path. Once in the OR for an extended period it can be difficult to leave the OR for another specialty. As an OR nurse you will generally not utilize many of the skills, and little of the knowledge, that you acquired in school. In addition you will not be truly providing direct patient care. If you don't have these skills, knowledge base, and experience well established prior to becoming an OR RN they can quickly fade into obscurity. I always recommend that new grads pursue critical care areas such as ICU and ER to get an extensive solid medical base to your practice before branching off into specialties that may severely limit your practice and skills. Most other departments will not want to pay you an experienced RN salary when they have to train or re-train you in the fundamentals of nursing practice. Good luck with whatever path you take!

About the only jobs available to u with no sort of certification or license would be patient care tech jobs in hospitals willing to train. You will probably end up on the floor, not in an icu or emergency dept. So dont expect excitement till u get some experience and an opportunity to transfer.I wouldnt recommend you take positions in surgical settings. Recent law changes have relegated PCTs to clean up duties instead of patient care duties in the OR. If u are very lucky and can find a hospital willing to train you, you can try for anesthesia technician jobs. Much higher pay and alot more intensive level of patient care. But very hard to get into without experience or knowing the right person already in the department. If you have a while before you can get into nursing taking a semester to become an EMT is well worth it. The training is really good, the job opportunities will be broader, and you will likely be allowed to do more in whatever job you do get. This program takes summers off, which to me is a waste. So in the summer I would recommend you find ways to get more training. I recommend taking a basic ekg class, followed by advanced cardiac life support. If you have any inclination to work peds, surgery, or emergency take pediatric advanced life support. If you are an adrenaline junkie and plan to get into flight or trauma nursing look for classes in basic trauma life support or pre-hospital trauma life support. The trauma classes teach great physical assessment skills. If you cant find these classes contact the paramedic training program at one of the colleges. Paramedics are required to have all of these certifications in order to graduate. Nurses are required to have none of them. I never understood this. Ill get book info when I find mine or get it from someone else since I dont own them all.

So my additional advice to any of you who either will not have any other choice but to attend el centro / northlake, or who decide to "stick it out". 1) Get a job that involves patient care as soon as you can. I cant stress this enough! You may think you cant work and do school. But the truth is you cant afford to not do it. I cant tell you how many of my classmates wish they had listened to me when I told them this in our first semester. There is nothing found in any book, on any disk, in any lecture or seminar, or anything on the web that will serve to make you a better medical practitioner than actually working with patients. It also has the upside of padding your resume and helping you network in facilities that you will probably be applying to for nursing positions when you are done with your program. Nursing jobs are nowhere near as plentiful as they used to be. 2) get your books as soon as you can and start to just do some light random reading before you start the program. You may not completely understand everything (and the lecture on the material wont help you either) but you will at least not be looking at the the material for the first time under the time constraints of a testing schedule during the semester. I personally never purchased the book box (those who did said they rarely, if ever, used most of the books in the box). Fundamentals of nursing, iggy med/surg, and the OB/GYN books are by far your main books. I bought the books that were 1-2 editions older and the information was identical, just maybe listed as a different chapter than the current edition. But I literally bought all the books I have used the past 2 years for under $50. 3) Learn everything you can about doing a very thorough and fast full assessment. You cant do anything for anyone without first finding out what is wrong. There is so little emphasis, instruction, and time spent in this program teaching you and letting you practice doing assessments. You should be able to go head to toe without missing any portion of your assessment without looking at notes or being reminded by someone of what to check before you get into your clinicals. I honestly believe that good assessment skills are the most important skill any medical practitioner can possess. The ability and knowledge to do something about what you find will come in time. But learn your assessment!!! 4) you will be provided with a syllabus for each section in the program. It is worthless! It basically tells you that you need to know everything, which is impossible. Use a combination of the power points, and the chapter summary from the book to guide you on what to study. The recordings on ecampus are straight from the lectures, and as I mentioned the lectures are less than worthless. Recently alot of my classmates have started to study for exams using NCLEX review books and they seem to be doing well. 5) Dont be afraid of the staff and admin. They try from day one to intimidate you and make you feel like you are so lucky you even made it into this program. They still cheerlead for their program even though it is in a steady state of decline. Consequently they believe you should just be happy with whatever they give you. Not True! Each of you accepted to the program are in the program because you are the best of everyone that applied. There is absolutely no luck involved. You earned your way there, you paid to be there, and your work is what is keeping you there. They have expectations of you, you should have expectations of them. Hold them to their obligation to keep you informed and notified of dates and changes(this is a huge problem in this program), provide you with proper instruction and guidance, and to honor any other promises they make. They cannot arbitrarily "kick you out" because you call them out when they are wrong. Trust me if that was true I would have been gone before my first semester, and multiple times every semester since then! The program admin must know that that the program is in trouble. They have just brought in a company called ATI as secondary educational tool. This company boasts of bringing programs to a 100% pass rates. I guess if you cant fix your own flailing program you find someone who you hope can. I hope that this will improve the experience for those of you just starting. I personally dont see the advantages of the new addition. I did however notice the significant added cost and workload. If I think of any other tips to help you guys out I will post them up.

I will preface by saying that this is my opinion. While this opinion is shared by the majority of my classmates it is still simply opinion based on my/our experiences with this program. I am well into the El Centro program now. My advice to all of you would be to look elsewhere for your nursing education. Particularly if you actually want or expect an education. I have to say that from my semesters of experience with this program it is inundated with mediocrity at the teaching level, and downright incompetence and apathy at the administration level. If you think that you can learn from a lecture that is read straight from the book or power point word for word with no additional information or explanation added, or get a substantive clinical experience from instructors who have very little recent actual clinical experience and a very poor working relationship with the floor nursing staff of the clinical facilities, then el centro/northlake may be the program for you. You will still have to deal with clinicals facilities that dont work out after you have chosen them because the program admin never actually locked in the site, clinical facilities that are completely inappropriate learning environments for nursing students, instructors who quit for better jobs days before the start of the semester, and administrators who make it very clear that they dont care whats best for your education and progression as a nursing professional. Before you get the idea that I am a student who is simply complaining because I struggle, let me assure you that my grades are always among the best of my class in both lecture and clinical. But this is entirely due to my knowledge base and experience coming into this program. I can honestly say that I dont feel that I have come out of any past semester with any useful practical knowledge gained directly from anyone or anything in this program. I would advis anyone considering el centro / northlake to do quite a bit more research. Definitely try to speak with some of the past and current students and get their opinions. I know that the vast majority of my class feels as I do. Keep in mind that El centros NCLEX pass rate has dropped significantly in the past 5 years since new administration took over. This is fact, not opinion. All im teeling you is to do your homework before you make your decision. It is advice that I wish I had before I accepted my position in this program. I can assure you that I definitely would have chosen a different program had I known the facts. Good luck with whichever path you guys choose.

Glad to hear from you guys. I also recieved my email today. I am looking forward to orientation so that I will have more information about the structure of the program. I think the first few weeks will be the toughest simply from a logistics standpoint. Im not sure about you guys, but I will continue to work fulltime during the program. I am fortunate in that I work 12 hour shifts, so I have the option to free up the 2 days needed for class and clinicals. But from what I have read the first few weeks are often just a mess with regards to scheduling. Hopefully it wont be as bad as others have made it out to be. But just in case, I am storing up my PTO.

I wanted to see specifically how many Northlake Spring 2010 students are cruising these posts? And see if anyone wanted to kind of share some background info? I am obvioulsy going to be there so I will start. If you are going to be at ECC in the spring feel free to jump in as well. Im hoping this will help everyone to not be complete strangers the first day of class. Me: - Northlake class SP10 - 36years - male - currently work as an anesthesia technician (3 years) - spent about 7 years as a paramedic (ambulance and ED, 2 years before that as an EMT-B) - ACLS Instructor for about 5 years , was a CPR instructor for the same until this year - prereq GPA is 3.8 - Hesi overall is 93 - all support courses completed - Live in Wylie Chime in with anything you want to share. Thanks

I recieved my acceptance letter for the SP10 Northlake/ECC program this past saturday. I am going to mail them my confirmation letter on weds since that is my next day off. I want to be sure I send it via certified mail so that I will have a record of its delivery to the admissions office. I actually sent my first application to them via certified mail, and the USPS lost it. Luckily I had my THR/El Centro nursing program application ready as well and was able to drive down to ECC on the last day applications were being accepted and physically put it in someone's hands. It would be good to hear from anyone else who is going to be out at Northlake with me in Spring.

I work for THR and have friends in the program or just starting. From what I have learned I would advise going the El Centro or Northlake route. While the expenses of THR program are supposedly completely covered by the hospital system. Alot of them are actually covered through reimbursement at the end of the semester. So you still have to come up with money up front. In addition if you are working as clinical staff within the THR system you probably wont be eligible for any of the bonuses afforded to new hires once you get licensed and start working as a THR nurse. This could equate to thousands in lost signing bonuses. Looking over their programs cost sheet, they seem to really overstate the costs they cover to come up with the $15K payback they require if you dont come work for them for 2 years after completing the program. They also dont mention anything about your starting rate of pay at the end of the program. I know our annual raises equate to about 5% on the top end per year. I would think that skipping around hospital to hospital for the first couple of years would help bolster your pay much more significantly than hanging around THR for 2 years. I know that I currently work at the higher end of a non-certified tech level position and make more than the GNs working in our hospital. I may actually make around what the lower end of the new RN scale is set at as well. Anyway, from what I have learned, most people I have spoken with in or entering the THR program given the choice after gathering their information, would have chosen to go the standard ECC route. Im not saying its not a good way to go, just passing on what I know about it. On the upside, there is a very small applicant pool. so your chances of getting in are very good with just about any 2.5 or better GPA. But they do require that you have all of the general/support courses completed before you can even apply.