sweetER

I am not sure how it is in Alabama, but I work in N. Ga near Ringgold where there was an EF-4 and they are turning volunteers away , and are not allowing nurses to help unless they are also an EMT or paramedic with one of the EMS services.

I graduated in December and started my first nursing job at a level 2 trauma center in February. I knew I wanted ER and went after it, and that was the best thing I could have done for myself because I LOVE my job. My coworkers are amazing, my preceptor is knowledgable and a great teacher, and all the more experienced nurses are very supportive of me. That said, it isn't easy, but having that strong support really has helped me learn quickly and grow much faster than I would have if I'd been somewhere that didn't have adequate support for a new grad. My coworkers make sure I am not only learning the routine parts of ER nursing, but that I get the chance to handle codes, traumas, and critically ill patients. If you have a good preceptor and supportive nurses around you, ER won't be any harder to adjust to than med-surg.

In our ER, we have four single-bed trauma/resus rooms. Two of them are assigned to one team of nurses (usually start out the day with 2 and get a 3rd nurse around 9am-11am) and the other two rooms are assigned to another team of nurses. Both teams also have a hall of 6 "regular" rooms. Whenever a trauma or code comes in, though, one nurse from three different halls is assigned to be on ONE room's trauma team. So each hall only loses one nurse while a trauma/resus is being worked. It sounds confusing, but it seems to work really well for us.

I am a new grad in ER, and have been on orientation for about two months. I got my required number of IV starts for checkoff purposes pretty quickly, half of which my preceptor coached me through, and now I can't seem to hit a sewer pipe with a 24g. I know practice makes perfect, etc., but I am used to getting things, especially technical skills, pretty quickly. So when I go in and can't get a 20g in a very well hydrated young male with great veins in two sticks and my preceptor goes in a hits it first try, I get SO frustrated. I'm sure it'll get better, but I feel bad for all my patients while I'm getting there... How long did it take before you were pretty good at starting IVs?

Definitely keep trying to land a tech job. I got one just six months before graduation, and because of that, got an RN job (at another hospital) exactly where I wanted - ER- before taking boards. Many of my classmates are still looking for jobs. It helps!

Same as you! We check at triage and then only recheck if it was abnormal. Our educator doesn't seem to mind.

No. Life is too short to spend any of it working somewhere you won't enjoy (unless there's no other options). I knew I wanted ER after graduation, so I turned down offers for other units and persistently went after the ER job I wanted. I got it and couldn't be happier. If that's what you see yourself doing, and later want to try something else, you can make it work. Good luck whatever you decide!

Thanks so much! That does help answer part of my question! :)

I'm a new grad in ER, but I love it so, so much. The people I work with are amazing- I've never been anywhere with so much teamwork and camaraderie amongst the entire department (dr's, nurses, techs, everyone). I love that even as a new nurse, I can speak openly and bluntly with our dr's/MLPs, tell them what I think about a patient, and they really take what I say into consideration. I love that I get to see so many different types of patients and that there is never a day that was the same as the last. I don't see me going anywhere for a long time.

I'm a new nurse in ER, and our ER doesn't use a lot of techs, but one thing I would LOVE is if every tech who walked a chest pain patient to their room from triage would go ahead and put them on the monitor for me instead of coming to me and telling me there's a CP patient in the room and leaving. That would make my day just a little easier.

I guess I should clarify. I agree with what everybody else said about assessing your patient and taking into consideration their PMH when administering a bolus. In my ER, though, we run boluses at 999mL/HR 99% of the time - but just because it's going at 999 doesn't mean we're gonna give the whole liter. On older/renal/chf patients we'll still run it at 999 but only give a 250 or 500 mL bolus.

Bolus on a pump = 999mL/hr.

Wow. I think targeting BSN nurses is really uncalled for. I am a BSN nurse, but the nurses I work with are about 70% ADN because we have an ADN program in town where most of them went. I respect them immensely, and I don't view either one of us as better or worse than the other. We all end up having to perfect and apply the things we learned during school to our particular job situation after school is over. As for my particular school, they focused a great deal on hands on learning and being able to work independently, so mine and my colleague's school experiences were probably very similar. I worked as a tech before graduation, and occasionally nurses would help clean and toilet patients, but it was largely the techs' responsibility. If we were short a tech and two or three patients needed help at the same time, they might have to wait longer than they should have had to. It sounds like a bad case of understaffing in this particular scenario, and I don't think education had anything to do with it.

I am looking into UAB's FNP program, and I noticed that although it used to clearly state that because it was online, out of state students would be charged in state tuition, I don't see that on there anymore. Does any one recently enrolled know if this is still the case? Also, I was wondering if any one who is currently enrolled or already graduated can tell me about the financial aid available there. I noticed they have lots of scholarships available, but do most students get some sort of scholarship help and how much did you really end up paying out of pocket after everything? Any information on all the costs would be helpful. Thanks!

I haven't used the cardiology III but I bought myself a Master Cardiology for graduation and I love it! I had a Littman Master Classic during school and also loved it, and really thought a stethoscope couldn't get much better than the master classic since I heard fine with it, but with the master cardiology everything is so clear and loud! I work in an ER so we do see peds patients- the master cardiology comes with a peds adapter, which I haven't used, but when I've used it my steth alone on a baby it works just fine and I heard everything I needed to. Pretty much any stethoscope- including the disposable isolation ones from the hospital- is going to be fine for taking BPs.