bloodlikefire

Just passing on the Good news. THE TRICK WORKS!!! My name showed up on the boards website today. WOOT WOOT WOOT!!!

Just needed to shout this out somewhere. I took NCLEX-RN today and got the good pop-up. YEAH. Just need the board to send offical word now. Good Luck to you all.

wow, way to drag back a dead post. the uopx used to use hesi and all current students as of july, 2011 will finish with hesi, but all new students will be using ati. they just switched this year. i am in my final class and cannot wait to never have to see this place again. the current scores for hesi are 800 for med/surg, 850 for specialty tests, (peds, ob/gyn, psych) and 900 for rn exit. no one will tell us what the pass/fail score for ati is. the tests are currently only on "clinical" classes, i.e. med/surg, psych, ob/gyn, peds, and adv med surg. each of these classes have a pass/fail component. don't pass the test, don't pass the class. sometimes you get a re-test, within 2 days, other times no retest. you can retake one class once if you fail. unfortunately, with no one in charge right now (program director left suddenly recently), almost no one can answer any questions about what qualifies for a retest and what doesn't. the program will take between 2-5 years to complete depending on how many of your units the school will accept. overall, i do not recommend the uopx to my fellow lvn's, at least not at my campus. i hope the programs in az, co, and hi are better run.

i lived literally across the street from my lvn school. i could see the college from my bedroom. as for my completion lvn-bsn, i had a 70-mile drive 1 way. i had to drive at least once a week and twice or more for clinicals. can you afford the time and money to drive? gas and car related expensive add up fast. is your school full time (3-5 days a week) or less? i can tell you its possible but your social/family life will suffer. i will be finishing my travels to school next month and couldn't be happier that i will never need to drive that far for school again. if you decide to take public transit, you can use the travel time to study. good luck applying!

i will wish you luck, if you wish me luck. i have a pass/fail hesi on monday with a target score of >850 in advanced med/surg. i just want these stupid classes and testing to be over and done with!!! good luck to you!!! break a leg, or a computer screen!

i'm in the same boat as you. i have 79 days to go. today was my last clinical day (i hope), and i had a horrible patient (od in icu who didn't want help), followed by a horrible drive home (cut off on i-5 and then brake checked at 70 mph). i have a massive pass/fail test on monday, hesi with score >850 needed. i just want to leave this stupid school and get on with my life! i'm so tired of the homework and the studying and the ******** with classmates and instructors! i just want to scream at some of them, "hey, grow up and learn something." does anyone else get the feeling that some of there classmates are going to kill a patient when we graduate??? so in other words, i could use some motivation as well at this point.

q1. fluid status is related to circulation always follow the abc's of nursing. fluid status is more important than pain. q2. liver cirrhosis with acute confusion is a mentation issue which is most likely hepatic encephalopathy. a confused patient is more likely to fall, i.e. is a safety issue. safely is more important that pain. this is just my . good luck.

my first job out of lvn school was prison nursing. there is nothing like flu clinics and tb screening for 6000 inmate in a day to help you get ready for im and id shots. the flu shot is generally 0.5 ml as others have said, make sure to give that amount unless you formula says something different. know you landmarks for the deltoid muscle and make sure to brush up on anaphylaxis, as this is your major likely problem, it's unlikely but bad if it happens. you do not need to use the whole needle, as other said for skinny/ boney people scope up as much of their arm as you can. if the person is a big fatty like me, use the whole needle. remember to use your critical thinking skills when giving shots and you will be fine. good luck.

i don't think winning is the correct term. thank god i'm almost done with this school. p.s. i don't think any future clinicals will be held at that location. i had a long conversation with the campus chair about that site.

wow do i ever have you beat. i had one clinical in my geri class in which we did nothing, and i mean nothing for the 10 hour day. we literally sat in the conference room and stared at each other until lunch. came back and stared some more. it was an excruciation experience, which made me write a letter to the college campus chair. bathing and vitals would have been a blessing at this facility. i hope it gets better for you.

sorry again to disagree, but some of the best nurses i have worked with as a student have been the nurses that other nursing students say is a mean *****. if you work hard the nurses will see that and be encouraged to engage you and teach more. being timid may be acceptable in your first semester, but you need to get over it quick. clinical's will be over much too soon, and you could be the new grade nurse who has students following them around. as an example, i hate charting, i hate my hand writing and i can't spell simply words right half the time (i live for spell check). before i would always write my narrative note on lined paper and run it by my nurse or ci before writing it down. this being my last semester, i stopped that practice and now freely write in the charts as i need to. i have never been told my charting needs work this semester.

the bolded statement above is your problem. i am a nursing student in my last semester. it is not the nurse's job to find you when something good is happening, it is your job to know what's happening with your patient and be there for it! i constantly ask my patients real nurses, is there anything going on with your other patients that i can help with/do. i left my lunch break just last week because i heard an overhead page for a translator, which i thought might be for my patient, good thing i did because the translator was for my patient. clinical's are what you make them; it's your responsibility to learn as much as you can from as many resources as you can on the floor. i asked a random floor nurse if i could suction a patient's trachea next time, just to get it checked off for my list. take the lead and ask for what you want to see, i.e. who is getting a foley put in today. and can i do it? your nurses will love you for this and more importantly, you will learn more this way. good luck with the rest of your clinical's.

a. 1) yes. always follow protocol. ask yourself how you would feel if your patient killed themselves??? 2) as soon as they stated any suicidal ideation, if they acted on it in any way you license is gone. your charge nurse and nurse manger agreed. 3) you did nothing wrong and you very well may have saved the patient's life! 4) do not feel guilty, you took the necessary and reasonable steps after a patient expresses these thoughts. when i was working in a prison, i had a patient come to me one day saying he was thinking about killing himself. i immediately stopped what i was doing, told another patient to shut up, as he was only complaining about some knee pain, and escorted this patent inside and had him searched for weapons. i have never seen psych move faster, as he was in with a psych doc within 15 minutes. if the guy complains to the board remember that you followed protocol and acted as any reasonable nurse would. tell the doctor you would do it again. you don't answer to the doctor. please remember you just could have saved his life that night.

sorry i can't help you with the new jersey schools but if you are willing or able to relocate; the university of phoenix has an lvn to bsn programs in denver (co), phoenix (az), modesto (cal) and hawaii, i don't know which city. please research this program if you are interested at all because i am not recommending them just giving you some information.

my geriatric clinical was a joke. i am in an lvn to bsn course. the instructor was a foreign born nurse. her accent was so strong i could only understand every other word she said. her written english was not spell checked or grammar checked, and her syntax was horrible. at the ltc facility we were assigned to do am med pass and nothing else. hello we're lvn's we know how to do med pass. because our clinical's were on the weekends none of the rn's were around, less than 99 beds in the facility, which meant we were following around lvn's in the ltc center to get our rn licensed. plus to make matters worse the place was so bad, all the licensed staff takes their lunch together, leaving cna's in charge for the 30 minutes. when i wrote that i found all the staff taking their lunch together i was told i needed to be quiet because that is their regular practice. so this places regular practice is to have no licensed staff on the floor for 30 minutes every day! i turned in a letter of my clinical experience to the dean as soon as my grade posted, because there was no way i wanted to spend any more time in that hell hole.

no, no, no... i do all my printing on the computers at campus. if they have a problem with that, don't charge me a 95 dollar fee each class.

you want disorganized, listen to my school. we have 5-week long classes, one after another, except for most clinical classes that are 7 weeks long. our geriatric clinical was coming up and no word from the school. the thursday before clinical's we got an e-mail stating clinical's start this sat-sun. for our current adv med/surg we received an e-mail the week before saying why didn't your class organize themselves into clinical groups, it might have been that we never received confirmation of clinical times and days. our classes are posted well in advance up to 30 days before the new one comes up, we have been pushed back 5 times because they never bothered to secure an instructor for the class. we receive calls telling us about test days in the middle of the week with little to no notice. i know several students have been told to turn in clinical paperwork, which the clinical instructor was supposed to turn in. if my tuition has gone up each year, why can't they lock down the basics like which clinical site, at which time, with which clinical instructor? in addition, we never know when these people are out of the office, which seems to happen with a great deal of consistency. 250+ student nurses and 1 academic adviser, who never has answers for us, is a bad plan.

just a quick distinction, she is libeling you if it's a written evaluation. slander is spoken. libel is written. sorry, good luck with your decision.

just in case you are not aware, if you have an rn license and you accept a cna job, you will be held accountable for the rn level of care. this puts your license at great risk if you work under your level because you will not get rn experience or pay but you must treat your patients at the rn level. i would strongly recommend against it.

fair warning, here in california, the brn will not accept indiana state university bridge program either. they were making a big stink over this a couple years ago, that people could be out a lot of money with no rn license to show for it. i'll so glad i'm getting my initial license here in california, that way they will always have to accept my license if i move back in a couple of years. i currently plan to move to my first nurse job anyway that excepts me. i'm so glad i came into nursing relatively young, when i still have the option to move as needed. as for the charge that it is unfair that california doesn't accept excelsior, welcome to life. life is not fair. more states then not accept excelsior. you will just have to pratice nursing in a state that does accept it.

i am not worried about the care plans that are due, i need more practice at that stuff anyways. my assessment and care plan skills are weaker than they should be. so far, our longest paper was around 10 pages. only three classes left! we finish in december!

Everyone in my class mastered APA a long time ago.

just found out last night that my schools finial clinical class, advanced medical/surgical nursing has no papers due in it. all we need to do is focus on our readings, and pass the tests and post-hesi. i'm a really good test taking and writing papers is so time consuming. there are approximately 5 chapters of assigned reading a week. (most chapters are 50 pages and take 2 hours each to read). what do you guys think? is a nursing class without papers good or bad? do you prefer reading (and retaining information) or writing papers?

yeah that's not going to happen. my agency refuses to pay overtime and has several questionable policies about breaks and work shift options. i also know for a fact that at least one rn they hired was accepting lvn pay for doing shifts. so no way are they paying two nurses for any amount of time. peri-care on the patient doesn't seem to have the same problems that the bed bath does. a couple of wipes and a clean diaper and chuck pad under takes less than 5 minutes total and the patient doesn't get so combative.

since i started my bsn program i have gained 50 lbs. no time to prepare proper meals i.e. eating fast food too much, and no time for exercise has greatly increased my weight. between that and stress eating and i ballooned. i am hoping to restart exercise and better eating once i graduate, but these boards don't show that life gets better in the first year of a new grad nurse. this year is about finishing school, next year is to get a new grad job and get myself back to a healthier weight.