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My work is developing a preceptor training course. Here are the resources I am reviewing right now to see if they can help us to have better preceptorships and orientations. Core Concepts for Clinical Preceptors and Faculty - John Hopkins School of Nursing, $10/module including CE, bundle of 9 save you $10 Core Concepts for Clinical Preceptors & Faculty | School of Nursing at Johns Hopkins University Preceptor Education Program *FREE* http://www.preceptor.ca

I did an ABSN/MSN program. The lack of experience had it challenges with no nursing experience when you are applying for NP jobs. A lot of large corporate employers will automatically kick you application out because they want some form of experience but there are plenty of people who will hire you without. I found that employers would had more ability to chose applicants they liked best over strict institutional requirements were easier. For examples, private practices are willing to hire new grads if they interested in training someone up. Government agencies and hospital systems were a no go directly out of school. It is important to make up for your lack of existing clinical knowledge by studying hard and absorbing as much as you can in clinicals. At the end of the day, if you want to have a good NP brain and skills, you are going to work to achieve it regardless of your previous experience. The pursuit of excellence is what determines the quality of NP you are going to be. I have precepted and oriented APRNs with no experience to 20 years experience as an RN. Your mind, motivation, and desire to learn is what make you into a good NP. Previous RN experience is a small help but only if it directly related to what your APRN practice site does. After 5 years of practice, people misunderstand me when I explain my nursing pathway. They often think I am joking when I explain I had no nursing experience prior to being an NP. Today I am a resource person and known for being the person who knows a lot about everything. My fellow NPs says they would never know I had not worked as a nurse prior to being an APRN.

Every 5 years is with HPV DNA testing for over 30 years. Cytology alone is different.

The current guidelines are slowly being accepted. At this point insurances are still paying for annual pap smear, so some offices continue to do them annually for money and patient preference. The reason that guidelines are do not reccomend younger than 21 and less frequently is that most healthy individuals will clear the infection. Cervical cancer is usually slow growing, so it should be detect if screen for every few years. Studies showed that frequent more screening led to excessive invasive treatment without waiting to see if mild cases would resolve on their own. Cone procedures and multiple leeps affect the cervix structure and can result in future high risk pregnancy related to incompetent cervix. Convincing the patients can be the hardest part. Sorry I do not have specific references for the research but that is what we learned in school was the reason behind the changes in the guidelines. I just started at a practice that requires that everyone get a pregnancy test to recieve birth control. At Contraceptive Techonology, I learned the research shows you only need a good history and BP. No pelvics either. There was an article just published about the fact pelvics may be overly used as an annual screen and provide patient with false reassurance. There have been some studies I believe in other countries that show COC used as an OTC are safe but I do not think that is going to happen in the US anytime soon. Chlamydia screening is reccomended to be done on everyone sexually active under 25 due to the high risk of undiagnosed infections and the long term consequences (infertility and PID). If you can do urine screen, there is no need to do a speculum exam to do the swab. Hope this help :)

Some states require you to have a BSN to participate in MSN programs. An example would the GA. I am not sure how this would affect your job prospects though.

I have struggled with a similar problem. One of my friends in an FNP program chose to attend several of the WHNP lecture to expand her knowledge but I don't know if your current school has that option. Depending on your school, you could try to arrange an extra clinical rotation in gynecology if you have the time in your program and that way you have more experience than the typical FNP new graduate. FNPs do get jobs in women's health but the learning curve might be steeper when they first start depending on how their program content. As WHNP student, half of the appointments are gyn and the others are prenatal/postpartum. The FNP program at my school only has 40 hours of women's health clinical versus the WHNP 600. To me its a calculated risk between the chance you will get the job you want vs when the loan payments start. Look into the market where you plan to practice. I know that the market I am looking out has few WHNP jobs, so I have decided to finish the ANP portion of my program. Unfortunately the WHNP/ANP is no longer being offered at Emory. It is hard to choose and to stick to your choice but you could get a post masters in either specialty or just expand your own skill set through self education (learn more gyn as an FNP). While WHNP scope usually include the primary care of women, it has been suggested in some discussions at school that a WHNP practicing in a primary care practice including the treatment of non-gyn conditions could create some legal risks.

I have been struggling in clinicals with a lack of confidence. I feel that even if we went over the information in class I have trouble remembering it until we do it in a case study or I have a patient with the condition. I can remember most information from discussion based classes, but struggle with powerpoint dependent teaching style. I can read the same chapter three times and barely retain anything in long term memory. I am entering my third semester as WHNP and just now learning about abortions and infertility (so frustrating!). I got two case study question books that have helped but am looking for other good study tips. My grades are fine despite the way I feel about my knowledge base. While I understand how seeing patients at the same time as learning can be beneficial, i believe it comes with some short comings. Due to medical and family issues, i have fallen behind in clinical hours but am continuing full time in the program with supervision. I am working with the school to schedule enough clinicals to catch up. My preceptor is very supportive and says I need to trust myself. Just not sure how to go about it.

My specialty is women and adult health, but I really would prefer to practice women's health. I will only be working in primary care. Many of the local hospital refuse to hire full time students and they require a two year contract full time (most likely nights) after their new grad program (3 to 12 months depending on unit). My program is less than two years, and I have heard it is impossible to work full time later on in the program. I am also planning to move out of state to my bf and get married as soon as I finish. I would love to work in a primary care clinic but the market where my school is located is already flooded and clinics do not hire new grads. Half of the incoming class is new grads (5 out of 9) and the school has a 100% pass rate. My concern is just about the stress of life. My relationship is long distance, so not having weekends and working evening makes it even harder. The chronic stress has just been overhelming in addition to be cut off from my support system. I am just hoping grad school won't be as crazy especially since I will be working clinic hours. Thank you for the advice.

Thank you so much for your comments. The school had us take the graduate level research, ethics, and health policy classes, so there might be a few less papers. We have to take elective to make those credit hours up though. I have talked to the program director. Graduates from other program said their friends switched specialties because this particular degree because of the clinical hours (1000 hours total). Maybe there will be grad students at the orientation. Thank you again.

Hello, I am graduating with my B.S.N on friday and start my NP program two weeks later. My program is acclelerated so this spring semester we had to take 18 credit hours, which was almost too much for me. This past month (part of summer semester) I have been doing about 40 hours of clinical a week and have classes one day a week. I can't wait for my week of vacation. I was wondering how diffucult juggling all the readings and clinical is during an NP program. I have two days of classes and 1.5 days of clinical for the first semester. Later in the program we have 2 half days of class and 3 days of clinicals. I have heard several times that there is a ton of reading during NP programs. I was wondering if anyone could estimate this as equal, less, or more than my current workload. I am all set to go, but I just want to have accurate expectations for the next 17 months of my life. If you have any tips on NP school vs nursing school or biology degree please feel free to give. Thanks in advance.

The National Association of Nurse Practitioner's in Women's Health lists all the programs available and you should be able to filter by state. I am am about to start WHNP/ANP program and have yet to find any type of ranking. It is such a specialized field I guess. Most of the curriculums are similar and 600 hours of clinical are required by NCC to sit the board. I think it is what program fits your needs. Talking with past students and the program coordinator can be very helpful.

I do live in very backward state when it comes to nursing that does require a BSN to pursue an MSN in Advance Practice (NP, CMN, ect). If i had gone to the CNL program, I would have had to move to another state to pursue my MSN. Just be sure to look at the nurse practice acts to see what is in the scope of practice and education requirements for each role in your state. This information is usually found on the state's board of nursing website.

Thanks for clarifying the certification thing. I did not mean to imply that certification was needed to bill. I was trying to highlight possible business economic reasons for using a PA or NP as first assist rather than an a RN. Is there any evidence to support using one type versus the other?

We had someone talk about this in a lecture. FNP can train as first assist with training. If I remember correctly, there are programs to get certified as a first assist. It is actually a financial benefit, because the FNP can bill for their time as compared to nurse. The other alternative is to go to PA school. At my school, there are a number of nurses in the PA program. According to some sources, PA program gives more procedural training and would be more likely to include surgical related stuff like a rotation in general surgery. I have no idea if PA need additional training to be a first assist. PA can also bill as a first assist. With an mid-level role, you have the scope of practice to round on the patient afterward the surgery and write orders for the patients. The speaker stated some physician enjoyed this additional benefit, because it allows them to see more patients. I would guess this is dependent on experience and the relationship with the physician. If you are really interested, you might want to talk to someone who does this type of work and get their opinion.

I looked at doing a CNL program, but ended up in ABSN/MSN due to my career goals. Making it a Master's changes your federal financial status to graduate student. If you already have a bachleor's, you are not eligible for certain federal aid programs. If you do a second-degree BSN program, you might be less financial aid. You can get more aid if you are a graduate student if you have a previous bachelors. Check out federal aid websites and talk to school administrators about this stuff if you have questions. I have not idea about the market for CNL. But if you want to pursue an advance degree (Advance Practice Role, ect) at some point in time, SOME states require a BSN. An MSN cannot be used to fulfill the requirement.

We have had two recruiters talk about listing your previous work. Although they focus on school, clinicals, ect , having work experience of any kind or health related can be used to differentiate you from other candidates. Potentially just listing/talking about your great previous employment could get you the job over another relatively equal candidate. We were told to even list your job at the campus post office (college students) or your previous career in the Y industry if that is the work history you have. Once you have work experience as an RN for 5 or 10 + years, we were told it wasn't worth listing.

I was wondering how the McMance book worked out. We are using it for the bsn portion of our program. I guess we might be using for the graduate portion too. Most people don't read it because it is so intense, but I like all the details. I feel without the details you can't make everything fit into the big picture. I do have a bias as my first degree is biology though.

hello, I wanted to let you know that at my school we have several pregnant undergraduate and graduate students. Everyone is really supportive. While some were in labor, they were updating our pediatrics class via text messages. Others are finishing up before their due date and doing well. I wish you the best of luck! Congratulations!

Hello, I managed the facebook group for the ABSN 2010 group. I know you talked to some of my classmates at the admitted students day. We had the idea of a program group so all the classes can have a common website and also have a separate one for each of the classes. I went ahead and created a facebook group for the program called "Emory ABSN/MSN Program". Please feel free to join and ask questions. Congratulations on your acceptance to the program and we look forward to seeing you this summer!! :)

If you have been accepted into the program, we have a facebook group for the entire program "Emory ABSN/MSN Program". Good luck!

Originally post by newguy8 "I'm still excited about the opportunities but I'm planning to augment the regimented education with pre-medical science courses and as much clinical as I can manage to stuff in." Hello, I am a student in the second half of the BSN portion of my DE program. First I wanted to comment on taking lots of medical classes. My first degree was in biology and I focused very strongly on medical biology. Totally premed education. I took immunology, medical microbiology, drug research, abnormal psych, genetics, cell biology, neuroscience, ect as part of my degree. They have proven to be a great help and a bit of a burden. Having a strong science background can mean you have a great insight into the physiological process or a disease such as an additional HIV reading that talked about the human leukocyte antigen alleles. I was one of the few people who understood that part of the reading. The downside is the nursing undergrad programs tend to generalized things. We cover three lectures on communicable diseases when I have taken an entire class which covered one disease every class, which was nothing in the scheme of things. It can be a bit frustrating. The generalization of the education allows nurses to go into some many different areas in new grad programs to get their specialization. I hope/think the pre-med background will pay off more in the NP program or if I chose to pursue nursing in one of the specific areas. My only advice is depending on the strength of your background it is easy to come off as a "smarty pants" when it comes to physiology and science. For example in my eye a question about the mechanism of changing oxygen and hemoglobin binding affinities in relation to increase pH is a perfectly valid question when discussing ABGs. In the professors eyes, it was irrelevant and she couldn't answer the question. She chose to ignore me. Another student was angry with me for asking question she didn't understand. But there are other student who appreciate the knowledge a EMR sales person (one of my classmates) or biologist brings to the table. Overall I am very glad I have such a strong science background and recommend taking as many science classes as possible before an NP program. In relation to the message boards: I did get a lot of junk from my undergrad friends who went to med school. They said I was taking the easy route out blah, blah, blah. Some were convinced once I explained more about why I wanted to be an NP. Truthfully I would rather have my NP friend provide my primary care than some of my MD friends. But I would rather my MD friend be the one to perform heart surgery on me. Some of it is a lack of knowledge and beliefs about NPs. Hopefully they will have respect for NP once they realize what NP really can and can't do and do and don't know and we can respect their expertise in turn. The third eye stare is amusing on interprofessional days when I get introduced to med students as the undergrad friend who chose the nursing school for my second degree!

Hello, I am currently a B.S.N student in an accelerated programs and am half way done. When I applied I was also accepted in the school's Women's Health and Adult Health Master's Program. In the Fall 2011, I will be starting my Master's which takes four semesters. I decided to get the Adult Health as a backup given it only adds a single semester and double the amount of clinic hours (~1100 hours) I will have to do. I have heard getting a job as a WHNP can be very difficult and am looking for advise on ways to improve my chances of landing a job My first B.S. is in biology, so I thought maybe I should look into being a research assistant for someone doing research in an area related to reproduction at my school. I am unsure if a clinic would find research experience valuable when looking to hire an new WHNP. I have also thought about working as an R.N while my master's, but I would be forced to sign a two year commitment as a new graduate. I have thought about trying to work at an reproduction-related office, but don't think they would want a new grad. (If this is untrue, please let me know) I have also entertained the idea of finding out some way to be involved in sex education, once I sit the NCLEX. I am really unsure if this would be possible though. My attempts to pursue this avenue have not been a successful yet. I REALLY want to work as a WHNP. A big area of interest to me since my first undergraduate degree has been reproduction. I have done several projects on the HPG axis, reproductive conditions, and even an interspecies comparison of estrogen receptor binding sites. I would appreciate any advice on what would be most valuable to pursue. It seems like I have many idea but can't figure out which ones are worth trying to follow or in what order. Thank you for any advice in advance. Sincerely, Elizabeth

Here is a link to the course schedule for the fall and the spring. Emory | Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing | Students Guide The schedule for ABSN students are listed on the third page of the pdf schedules. Nursing school pretty much consumes your life no matter where you go. Emory holds their students to a high standard. The difficulty depends on your other commitments and the ability to handle stress. To do well, requires a lot of studying for most students. Some students work part time or do research. They are working very hard toward improving any bumps that have come up along the way. Sorry I don't have a specific answer but outside of class the time commitment depends on the individual. Hope this partially answers any questions.

Hello, I am a student in the ABSN/MSN, and I kept a record of all the expenses. I spent about $1350 on ATI , book, supplies, certification/titres/vaccines. There are also several expenses that came during the term so far. Online sites have the best prices for books (B&N, Amazon, ect) and be sure to check to see if online supplement is included if it is needed for the class according to the book list. Elizabeth

My degree will be a B.S. in Biology. As long as you don't have a B.S.N. and complete the pre-reqs, it doesn't matter. I took my pre-reqs at Georgia State (for classes not offered at GT) and Georgia Tech (as part of my degree). I also applied as a transient to West Ga as a backup to Georgia State. Basically anywhere with the classes you need will work. I did like taking my A&P classes at Georgia State, because the other students in the classes were going to nursing school too. It really help to tailor the classes as a pre-req to nursing, physical therapy, and nutrition students. It would probably be a good idea to take your pre-req somewhere that has a nursing program or prepares students to go to nursing schools. Good luck