allymaye

Love my Littman Cardio too. Took me 3 steths till i found it. Worth the money. I spent more on trying to get away with cheaper than if I would have just gone ahead and spent the $.

I think clinical are a good indicator of if a student should stay in the program. When you are alone on the floor with your patient (no instructor breathing down your neck) do you enjoy it? Lets face it. This clinical time is the closest to "real life" nursing, we students have. If you hate it, are you really gonna want to graduated and then spend 40 plus hrs a wk doing it?

I always come to school about 3hrs early to school to study. We have a little lunch/break room that I love to study in because nobody is in there at 6:30 in the morning. I do most of my hw there. At home I just can't get focused. I also go to a classmate's house to study when we can. We each make the other study because if we didn't meet up we wouldn't even open our books. I also do a lot of reading in my car. On long car trips I get my boyfriend to read me my text book. It's really funny hearing him try to pronounce the med terms. LOL.

Many people in my class have the same problem with testing. Don't create your own story for the question. They want to know A + B = C, Not A + B = C and then D, E, F. You will get your questions wrong if you do that. Also go with your first answer. Most of the time if you change an answer it will turn out to be wrong because you have over thought it. If you have those questions that give you a list of patients and they want to know which patient you would help first, use the ABC's Airway, Breathing, Circulation to prioritize them. Remember, the questions on the board are about the perfect patients in the perfect hospital. The answer for the board may not always be the answer in real life. If you get a review book that give you the reason why the right answer is right AND why the wrong answers are wrong. These kind of books are so helpful because it explains what is wrong with the other answer choices. I hope this helps you with your testing. No matter which program or path you choose, they all end at the boards so testing is going to be the most important skills you have to learn. Good Luck! Just remember nothing worth doing is easy... :)

My 1st semester I went from 700-1600 2 times a week. This semester we go 700-1400 two time a week. It's long but we get an extra day off if we do 2 12 hr shifts instead of 3 8hr days...

I like the idea of these shoes but they are kinda expensive. Are there any other brands that might be cheaper? I don't want to spend $100 on the shoes and then hate them. :)

I had this guy that liked to do that to me. One day he interrupted me and I just stopped talking and stared at him blankly. "Well?!?" he yells at me. I was like,"Oh!!! Were your finished talking? I just didn't want to interrupt, because that would be just RUDE!" and just gave him my sweetest smile. All the other nurses giggled and turned away. He doesn't interrupt me as much anymore. When he does, I just give him another loooong pause. I smile at him and act like I can take all night if he keeps it up. LOL Just don't do anything like cuss or yell. You don't want to give her anything to report you on. Thats why I like the pause thing. What's she gonna say? You pause too long when interrupted?

Ha ha ha! I love it! Are we related? You would so fit in at my house!

Be very organized. For clinicals make your own assessment sheet so you can record everything you need. Some ppl call them brain sheets. There are a bunch on the net you can look at to get some ideas.

I can tell you that you have to give most of your time to school. I had to quite my job to keep up with all the work. The best advice I can give you is first, be very very organized. Know what is due when. Second, get ahead of the class. Read and do assignments as far ahead as possible. It keeps your stress level down. Nothing is worse than staying up half the night trying to finish homework for the next day. Third, keep some time for yourself. Set aside a time to do something you really love like reading a novel, or going to hang with friends. You don't want to burn out. I go to my BFF house every Sunday night to watch a movie and hang out. Last, if you feel stressed, just focuse on what you have to do right then. Don't worry about next week or next month. You'll give your self a heart attack if you doing that.

We had to have a drug test and a background test before we started the program and then again before we take our boards. Plus many hospitals require a drug before being hired.

I use a flat iron to get my flyaways under control. I also put some twists in the top that twist down into the bun or french twist. I have a link to a picture of the twists I'm talking about. They seem to keep my flyaways down. http://www.ehow.com/how_5875174_style-hair-easy-twisty.html Hope this helps!:monkeydance:

Congrats to everyone!!! I started in Aug. and it is soooo crazy. I have to say I am counting down the days till we graduate!

At my school we had a choice of clinical locations, but we had a lottery system because each hospital could only take 10 students. We also use the train and bus as well as carpool to get to clinicals. :monkeydance:

I started wearing shape ups about a month ago and really love them. I have noticed that when I wear regular shoes now my feet start to hurt really quickly now though. Before I switched to Shape Ups I wore Adidas running shoes with the really nice insoles they sell you at Finish Line. I just put the 2nd pair of insoles on top of the insoles that came with the shoes. I hated that the shoes were like $120, but they were well worth it. Hope this helps!