flightriskRN

This became a "thing" at the hospital where I had my guest nursing job back in 2011. I worked on a busy ortho floor. Fortunately, I left shortly after. But I remember thinking it was absolutely ridiculous.

Thank you for your reply! I have quite a few friends from Chicago and a sister who lives in the area, but I am hesitant to use their address as I think it would get tricky when I need to arrange interviews because I would need to fly and then I would have to be honest anyway about the fact that I still live in MN :)

Hi all! I am a BSN prepared nurse with 3+ years experience (one year ortho, two years gen med/surg). I currently live and work in Minnesota at a very well known medical center. I am interested in moving back to Chicago (originally from suburbs), and was hoping to get some information on the job market in the city. I have read a few threads that state it takes months to find a job....does this still apply when a few years of experience is involved? I am hoping to begin applying in August and would be hoping to find a job and move before winter - is this realistic? Would it increase my chances of being hired if I moved back to IL first then began searching? I do have several months of living expenses saved. Finally (sorry for all the questions) how much can I expect to make hourly in the city? Currently I make low 30s/hour and work a 0.8 FTE...so to make about the same amount of money I think I would need to make at least $28ish hourly and work a 0.9. Thanks for reading and I appreciate any insight!

You guys are going to love Summer III! I was a Summer III in 2010, came back to work at Mayo as an RN and am now a clinical coach. Maybe I'll be working with some of you this summer. We are excited for you to get here!

Hello! As another poster mentioned, if you have good time management skills, you will easily be able to maintain a social life while in nursing school. I graduated in 2011 magna cum laude, and all four years of nursing school I worked 20-24 hours/week as a CNA, went out almost every weekend with friends, ran or exercised 3-4 days per week, and maintained a relationship with my boyfriend at the time. I used student loans to pay for my books and tuition and worked to pay bills and to have cash for spending. Of course there were weeks I felt overwhelmed, but they were few and far between since I had good time management. You will find the same to be true once you graduate and are working as an RN...time management is key. Good luck in your endeavors!

I adopted a seven week old lab mix puppy my senior year of nursing school. Looking back, I realize that if was probably not the best decision for her sake since I was very busy with school and I also worked 16 to 20 hrs per week. I was fortunate to have a roommate who helped let her out when I was gone for more than four hours. However, trying to train her while also keeping up with school work was very tough. But we got through it and now three years later she is a wonderful, well trained dog and she's been a great companion for me when I was living alone my first two years out of college.

I have not heard of any floors that utilize travel or agency nurses at Mayo Rochester. None of the ones I have worked on at least...they might on the closed units such as OB but I'm not sure.

1. Minnesota 2. 2.5 years experience 3. Med/Surg, large hospital 4. $32 base pay, $1.90 eve diff, unsure of night shift. $2.00 weekend diff 5. No OP.. I have to agree with your user name :)

Sounds good.

I moved out of IL almost a year ago, but was making a little over $22/hr working on a surgical floor in a hospital in central IL. So your rate of pay sounds about right for a new grad.

I am not a new grad (one year experience), but will be moving there at the end of August to start work Sept 10 at St. Mary's :). I'm moving from Illinois. I did the Summer III program at Mayo in summer 2010, so am somewhat familiar with the area. Send me a message if you want, it would be nice to get to know a few people!

I work 3-11... water bottle (no coffee or I won't be able to sleep when I get home!), black and red pens, yellow highlighter, black sharpie, alcohol swabs, bandage scissors, and my chapstick.

I just started seeing a chiropractor this week for neck/back pain that has persisted despite pain pills, muscle relaxers, and heat/ice therapy. Hopefully chiropractic will work for me! As far as insurance goes, my insurance does not cover 1 cent of chiropractic, so the first visit was very expensive (Xrays, scans, etc), but the maintenance visits are something I can afford, if I believe that it will work for me. I have been to a chiropractor before a few years ago in highschool/college (before I was an RN(, and I remember it helping a great deal. I hope it works for you!

I just graduated from nursing school in May, and now have students assigned to me. It is very different from the other side of the fence, being the nurse instead of the student. I am just off orientation, and still working on my time management, and when I have students I have to try and factor them into the equation as well. And when there are 7-8 students on the floor and 1 instructor to check their meds, it is very frustrating because sometimes my medications/treatments are late when I could have done them myself and been done. However, since I was a student so recently, I understand the need to learn the basics, which I am more than happy to teach when I have the time. I am also grateful during the times when I am overloaded and the students are there to carry some of the load. The students on our floor are very helpful, and therefore are appreciated and treated well by the RN's. If the students would have had a bad attitude/been sitting around and not willing to help, the situation would be very different. Perhaps if you go into your clinical time with a different attitude, you will be better recieved.

Since I am not married and have no kids, but insurance is very affordable. It is about $120/month for health,vision, and dental, which I think is a very good deal. I still have to pay a small copay for office visits and for prescriptions, but it is worth it. I do not use a flex spend account.

My institution has this policy in place. Will not hire anybody that smokes, and if you were an employee when the policy was put in place and you still smoke, you pay a higher insurance premium. Going along with the thread about Baylor, my institution also has yearly wellness checks. If an employee does not comply and have the screening done, they also pay a higher insurance premium. I see no problem with it.

On my floor: Days 1:4-5, 1-2 aides, unit secretary Evenings: 1:5(6 on really busy days), 1-2 aides, no secretary Nights: 1:6, 1 aide I work evenings and it can get extremely busy if you have 5 totals (knees/hips).

You will definitely get orientation with a preceptor, mine is 8-10 weeks, more if needed. At least where I work, you are not expected to "hit the ground running". It is recognized that you just graduated and will not know everything, and may not know much at all depending how familiar you are with the unit specialty. Good luck!

I graduated nursing school in May (BSN) and have been working at my first job for about a month. I am working 3-11 on a post-surgical floor, and I got the job about 2 months before graduation. Pay is a little over $23/hour with shift differential.

I took NCLEX this morning, and had 11 SATA questions and one ordered response question. I finished with 75 questions and got the good pop up! In my opnion, the more SATA you get, the better you are doing :)

Hi! I just took NCLEX this morning and it was EXTREMELY similar to Kaplan questions. I found that Kaplan's strategy did not help me (I was already a confident test taker), but the QBank and question trainers were invaluable to my studying! My scores were in the low-mid 60's, but got into the 70's as I moved along. Our instructor told us that if you scored at least a 60% on question trainer 7 that you were ready to test. In my opinion, there is no "set in stone" time for you to test; it all has to do with how confident you feel. After having taken NCLEX today, I also feel that no amount of studying can truly prepare you; there will always be questions you flat-out do not know. But if you go into the test well rested, confident, and prepared, you will do just fine. Remember: NCLEX is a minimum competency exam! Good luck to you!

Hi! I am scheduled to take NCLEX on 6/20, but am feeling ready to take it sooner. I was wondering if I could view earlier available dates without losing my current appointment; that way if there turn out to not be any, I will still have my appointment on the 20th. Has anybody done this? If so, please let me know! Thanks!

I graduated in May, and I had a job lined up in March. About 75% of my graduating class of 68 have jobs, most with connections (worked as techs there, had an internship, etc). I am from central IL. I know up by Chicago it is almost impossible to get in as a new grad unless you did an internship at that hospital.

Having just graduated with my BSN a few days ago, I can tell you that it does not get any better. However, as you move ahead in the program you will get a better feel for what "actually" has to be read vs.what can be skimmed/not read but will be covered thoroughly in lecture. Although nursing school is extremely intense, I feel that it is completely worth it, as I am so well prepared for my job that I will start this summer!

I lived at Crossroads last summer.... The townhomes all have 3 floors. The bottom floor is the kitchen, living room, and half bath. The second and third floors each have 3 bedrooms and a full bath (there is a separate room for the shower and another one for the toilet and the sink is in the hallway). The bedrooms are decent size, the college provides you with a twin sized bed, desk, and dresser. There is also a closet, but the closet does not have a door on it. I also had enough room for a TV in my room. To answer your question, Room 6 is on the third floor. . The rooms overall are very nice, I liked living there. It was nice that all of the interns stayed out at Crossroads, we all got to know eachother! When you move in, Mayo staff will be there to check you in and give you a bunch of papers. Crossroads has their own rules, and you will have to sign a paper saying that you will adhere to them during your time there. Admittedly, they are strict, seeing as the college is a religious one. The rules state that there is to be no drinking, drugs, or members of the opposite sex in any of the bedrooms, or in the apartment past 10pm (or something like that). That being said, nobody from the college checked in on us once while we were there..... if you get what I'm saying ;-). Another nice thing about living there is the bus to get to work stops and picks you up right there at the college (you can't drive to work if you work days). The bus schedule seems very confusing at first, but you will figure it out after a week or so :) Any more questions, let me know!