BSNBritt

Thank you for your response! If I'm being hones then I have to admit that putting my 8 week old in daycare is just a deal breaker for me. I'm a lactation counselor and supplementing is pretty much out of the picture too. I think writing HR the letter though is an awesome suggestion that never entered my mind! Thinking about it now, I think it would look a lot better to them to follow your suggestion than to accept this job, have it all fall apart, and then leave after they've worked so much to accommodate me. Thank you for writing me back on this!

So I am an RN, BSN who has basically only worked psych since graduating five years ago. I did one year of pseudo skilled nursing (pretty minor stuff, one vent, some G/J tubes, some end of life). I recently applied for a med-surg job PRN, not thinking I would even get an interview. Turns out I got offered full time! Normally I would be THRILLED to get out of psych and try something new. Here's the catch: I'm 32 weeks pregnant :/ The hospital said that they might be able to work with me about starting some orientation at 1 day a week until I deliver, then having me come back at 8 weeks post baby to start on my full time. I'm having so much apprehension about it. On one hand I don't want to lose this chance and really feel like this might be my only opportunity for a long time. On the other hand I'm super worried about how to actually make this happen. I have a 3 year old, a husband in school full time, and no one who can help us with childcare at all. I'm dedicated to breastfeeding and was very successful with my first, but had a job where I could easily pump every two hours. That being said, I did have pretty significant post-partum depression though and struggled A LOT!. This job would be on nights too and I'm really a day person (especially with a newborn). Would I be crazy to take this? Crazy not to? Any advice, personal experience, or words of wisdom would be so greatly appreciated!!

To be honest, I'm not really sure what my goals are now. I thought I wanted something more medically geared than psych but now that I'm doing it, I don't know that I like it. I feel horrible saying this but some of the things I do are just kinda of gross. . I don't know that anyone LOVES digitally stimulating someone though. I guess I just want to keep my options open. The real big draw for the charge nurse position is that it pays about $8 more an hour.

Personally I've never had a provider tell me to place all three meds in different syringes. Where I was trained we always mix the two and leave the Benadryl in its own.

I've been there for only about a month but I applied for PRN and they sort of pressured me into taking 28 hours a week to help cover the floor. It's pretty bad . They have the worst staffing issues I've ever seen. In fact, I've seen direct care staff there working 40 hours straight just to cover the floor. I'm thinking I could stay PRN. They finally hired at least more nurses.

Hello All, I right now I have 5 years of experience in inpatient psych and just recently took a job at a skilled/long term facility to beef up my nursing skills. I was afraid of being labeled as a psych nurse "with no real nursing skills". I am getting a lot of skills at my new job, (jg tubes, trachs, wound, ect.) but I was just offered a charge position at my psych job. For those who have been in this game longer than me, which do you think looks better down the road on a resume?? Being a charge at a psych hospital or getting the medical skills that I'm not getting there? Thanks!

Hello, I've had the exact same fear, "Will I be stuck as a psych nurse for the rest of my life?". I started my inpatient psych job right out of school and kept it for going on four years. I have also applied for countless Med/surg jobs with not even an interview. Finally scored an interview for home health care and before they even started, the woman interviewing me just stopped and said, "You don't have the skills we would need". They recommended that I try to get a skilled nursing job. I applied for long term care and amazingly got the job. I feel lucky though, because other psych nurses I work with have told me that they can't find other jobs. One told me the only way she got out of psych was to do a nursing internship somewhere else. Psych is great but at the end of the day there are a lot of nurses that would say, "Psych nursing isn't REAL nursing", and some of those may be the ones reading your job applications. Anyway, my advice would be to PRN at a skilled nursing or long term care. That way you can at least have something to boost your resume.

Hello all, I just accepted a job at a new psych facility, and so far it's pretty awful. Besides the nurses being completely rude and hostile to me all the time, there are some shady things going on with their seclusion and restraint practices. For one, the documentation is terrible. They just write the total time spent in S/R but don't differentiate between the two. Another thing, is how long they allow patients to stay in seclusion. Average time spent in seclusion at this place is well over 10 hours! Seems pretty long to me. . . . The worst thing is that I think they aren't practicing 4 and 5 point correctly. First, I don't even agree with the use of 5 point anymore due to the risk of suffocation. Besides that, there was an incident that, at least to me, was TOTALLY illegal and unethical. A patient had been in seclusion for over ten hours, just sitting there doing nothing. He got bored, I assumed, and decided to rip the mattress off a wood bed frame. That's when he was placed in 5 point. The thing is though, he wasn't trying to hurt himself with it. He wasn't hurting himself AT ALL, and so it's pretty much that they restrained him to punish him. When I brought up this concern, I was basically told that I don't have as much experience as my orientation nurse and to mind my own business. Am I right? This job sucks.

I'm an RN, BSN working at short-term locked facility in Colorado. Today I was taking a mandatory quiz on holds (yuck) that comes with an ajoining powerpoint. In the powerpoint, there was a page about who can legally put someone on a 72 hour involuntary hold. I knew all of them, except when I saw RNs with a BSN! Uhhhhhhh I have that and as far I as know, I can't put someone on an M:1. I tried looking it up on the state's website without luck. Does anyone know if RN BSNs can place a patient on an M:1????????????????????? Thanks!

I only worked days, and used to be a morning person, but now I'm working nights full time. On my days off I typically sleep from about 0300 to about 1200. The biggest problem I've had with working nights, is feeling like I miss out on more during the day. Sleeping during the day hasn't been an issue for me. My tips are as follows: Light blocking drapes Cell phone setting of "alarm only" and going to bed as soon as possible once getting off work. Works for me, hope it works for you!

This hasn't worked in my experience. I work in an acute stay psychiatric hospital with an adolescent, adult, and pediatric unit. I've tried offering patients that were escalating a time out, or a PO med, but it's never really panned out. Most of the time the patient was too agitated to accept time in the quiet room. When I've offered a PO med and the patient's accepted, they 99% of the time do not take the med when I bring it. Looking back I think I've learned that when you get the order, give the IM. No patients like it, obviously, and most will beg you not to do it, but it's for their own safety (and the safety of others). The way I see it it's like this: Give them a shot that hurts and end it there, or let the situation go on that much longer and risk more? The ideal situation would be to de-escalate a patient before it gets to this level, but hey- this is psych and that's not always possible. I know it sucks. I've had to give an IM to a screaming naked 9 year old (he was trying to strangle himself with all his clothes, even his underwear) who begged me not to do it. It made me feel bad, but not so bad that I wouldn't do it to stop him from trying to hurt himself.

When I was a student, I had an elderly man with dementia. He pressed his call light, and when I came into the room he said, "Miss, all these phones are in my bed". He was referring to his telemetry monitor, call light, and TV control. I told him what they were and he just looked at me and said, "Nope. These are phones, and I want them out of my bed".

Thanks everyone for the advice! I am getting some MS skills working where I do. I did 7 blood draws in one shift once, ha ha. Lately we have been having a lot of more MS patients. . . in sorts. Things happening like seizures, EPS, A-fib, and cirrhosis from clozaril.

Hi Everyone, I graduated this year with my BSN and started working full time in inpatient psych right away. Before I started working, I had heard the recommendation to get two years of med/surg experience. I applied for a couple places with no success, and when I was offered a job in psych (my passion) I had to take it. Well now that I'm here and can see where the recommendation comes from. I work with a lot of psych nurses that can't draw blood, can't insert a foley, and remember virtually nothing about infection control. They admit that it's from spending years and years in psych. Now I'm worried about losing all of the skills I learned in school, and I feel like the longer I stay in psych-the less marketable I will be to any other field of nursing. How do you keep your skills up? Has anyone experienced that more years as a psych nurse equal less options in other fields? Thanks, Britt

This was a typo, and was meant to be "Past" "Pt. reports pasty abuse"