Tito RN

Well Bells, I completely see your point about waiting for the ICU job. My concern though is that the longer I work as a nursing home RN the less marketable I become. I don't know if this is a reasonable concern or not. Honestly the money is nice but I get about 26-30 patients each day I work and I work my a$$ off for the money. I am willing to take a pay cut at the nursing home job because I can always pick up few more patients with home health and still make the same money overall. And to the person that send me the private message. I can't send you the info of where I went to school or any of the hospitals I am speaking about until this whole thing clears up at least. I do have a bachelor's in nursing though and I make $100k or more just from the nursing home. And you mentioned going the LPN route, I would advice against it. Even my nursing home stopped hiring LPNs and I know they are suppose to have some LPN meeting next month at our work for the LPNs we already have. I don't know what the meeting is about but the LPNs are not happy about it so far. And the reason I did not private message you is because I have no idea where the reply button is for the private message.

First of all Kalyn, I love the OR. I love everything about it, but I am just worried that 10 years down the line someone looks at my resume and only sees me fit to work in an OR because my skills are so limited. Hope this clears up my situation. And traumaRU, Well I wanted to focus on critical care and I know the ICU job would benefit me more and in fact I would need 1 yr min of acute care experience. The only problem there is that its at a very undesirable hospital and I am worried about what I will learn. Also if schools and employers will look at the hospital and therefore me negatively due to this. The hospital has had many issues in the past from the state and with law suits...hope this clears things up a bit more.

I graduated w/ as a BSN in December, passed the nclex in January, got my first job as a home health nurse at the end of january, and then got a fulltime RN job at a nursing home. I went this route because I did not get a single call back from a hospital recruiter. I am making an easy $100k w/ OT, but I plan on going back for a masters as a NP. The problem is that I got 2 interviews from two hospitals. One is a prestigious Chicago hospital and the other one isn't so prestigious. One position is for the OR and the other one is the ICU. I know these two are usually top on the list of most nursing students. Please advice me, should I stay where I am at or quit my current jobs (which is the only way I can do either of the other jobs if I get it) or stay where I am at? I know the ICU especially will broaden my skills enormously, but the ICU job is at a poor chicago hospital. I don't know how much I can learn as a scrub nurse or a circulating nurse. For future growth what should I do? I almost know the answer, but I am hoping to get a different perspective from someone with more experience.

I am a pretty new grad also, but in order to land a job you can't turn down jobs. If you want experience you have to be willing to take on jobs with even horrible nurse to patient ratios. It is horrible to say, but the longer u r out of school without a job, the more you will forget and the less in demand you will become. Nursing homes all over have those unsafe number, but they are pretty much the only shot these day in getting a job. So earn some experience from there and move on to bigger and better. And I have never heard of a 60+ to 1 ratio, I have heard of 15-35 and even this is high, but this is the reality.

Thank you very much for the info. Have you at least gotten an interview from anywhere so far? Good luck on you job search as well.

That doesn't sound very promising for me. It sounds like I need to find one of these connections and start kissin some @$$. And when u say foreign nursing staff, do you mean they are actually being recruited from outside the country? Any suggestions on some area in the Northwest suburbs that might give me a better shot of landing a job? Keep in mind, I am really trying to avoid nursing homes.

It took me about 6 days including weekends. Its been quick cuz less students graduate during December. Good luck on the NCLEX!

Also I wish new nurses from other states best of luck in their job search, but please don't turn this into a topic about "I am from Indiana, or I am from NY...and so forth" I mean no disrespect to anyone,I am at a point where I hope get some clear answers.

Hello all, I have read through this forum several times, but first time writing. I applied at Loyola, Rush, Northwestern, most of the Resurrection hospitals, alexian brothers, advocate to name a few. I have only had one or two positive conversations with the recruiters. Does anyone know the current situation? I would like to hear from new RNs w/ a license who are just applying for jobs that do not have any tech experience. It would also be nice to hear from nurses who are currently working and know of the hiring situations in their departments. I have heard the following things to list a few: there is a current hiring freeze, we are hiring internally (but still list the position externally), new grad residency program is no longer offered, we get lots of applications (so no response even in 3+ weeks?), and ofcourse the most popular response that we are looking for more experience. And for those people on this forum that like to write "please look at other topics regarding this"...please don't write that because its not helpful at all. I am trying to get a current understanding of the job market and not what was posted maybe 2months ago or more. Thanks for reading and thanks for your responses in advance. _Tito