Ginyer

My husband and I are moving to St. Maarten in the Caribbean for him to go to med school soon and I was looking into going through a travel company to work there. I read the thread about the virgin islands and I have a feeling it would be about the same for the caribbean. I was just wondering if anyone has worked in the caribbean. Also will most large travel companies send you to the islands if you're looking to go? I may decide to just wait tables or something while we're there...but I'll be there a year and a half. I'd hate to not do any nursing for that long. Thanks for any information

I was freaking out when I took my test... I had mostly questions with the word priority in them ... such as which patient do you see first, with a patient with this diagnosis which symptom would be a priority to look further into... I had lower level questions too (it was really obvious when I was missing questions...they would go from like a paragraph long to one sentence long, really concrete thinking) I had 5 or 6 choose all that apply... 3 dosage calculations... and what freaked me out the most were my last ten questions (literally from 65 to 75) were drug questions I didn't know the answers to most of them... they were mostly which drug order would you question for a particular patient... I had no idea what it meant to end on a drug question, or if those were considered upper level or not... I also had a LOT of teaching questions and a few safety questions... I swear I was sick for two days with no appetite and hardly sleeping (tons of nightmares) ... I took my test on thursday the 31'st and I found out on saturday morning that I passed on the pearson vue website at 8:00...the exact time my test was scheduled Do not listen to people who say to check the state board website out first.... I heard your license information comes up 24 hours after you take the test (and I think for some people it does) but not for me and everybody I know so I was really freaking out... some people I know who took their test mid january, the state board is still just showing the expiration date of their temp license. Anyway, just thought I'd share my experience. It's a really painful couple of days or so but once you find out it seems like no time passed at all....

Well reading your post totally calmed me.... I was freaking out because my state board web site was still showing the expiration date of my temp license and some students that passed had their names show up on the state board website earlier than the pearson results... I took it Thursday and today is sat so I guess I may have to wait till monday... anyways, congratulations on passing!

Jen the last I heard was that we have no available real estate here; however, my roommate has family who found an apartment a couple of days ago and I also have heard of people who are still finding houses to buy...most apartments and rental houses are gone but I would start doing some research now. Homes that have been on the market for 10 years are being bought up. They're telling us there is nothing available but I have a feeling there are still a few apartments and houses in the area. I hope you are all safe and good luck. I can message you my email address if you need information once you find out what yall are doing so just let me know. Ginyer

I'm sorry if a thread like this has already been done. I live in Baton Rouge (60 miles west of N.O.) and just got power back and internet up. The schools here are starting back tomorrow so we just had to skip one week of clinical. The director of our nursing program let us know that we will probably be taking in a lot of the nursing students from new orleans into our program. I know the Pennington Biomedical Center here is taking in the medical students from the LSU med school which is in N.O. I was wondering if the nursing students had heard any information as to what they were going to be doing although school is probably the last thing on your minds at the moment. I think all of the nursing schools in the area (here and Lafayette) will be opening their doors to you from what I understand. We have students in my class that have lost their homes and family members to Katrina...I'm actually about to open up my home to a classmate who has no place to stay. While it sounds ridiculous for us to go to school in the midst of this crisis, I truly think it will be a good distraction. Quite a few classmates have 10 or more family members staying in their small homes with no electricity, multiple pets and are ready to go back just to get a break from all the chaos in their house. Anyway I hope you and your families are safe and I may see you soon. Ginyer

First let me start by saying that more than half of the people in my class have children, mostly young children. Some classmates have 3 to 5. So it's definately possible. Every school is pretty different as far as schedules go, class time and clinical time. I'm in class 9 to 4 three days a week, and in clinical from 7 to 3 two days a week. The classtime varies greatly each each..some days its only 9 to noon...some days its noon to 3, it just depends. Clinical times stay the same every week and vary each semester. My last semester in OB/nurse management will be 12 hour clinicals two days a week. You can probably call the school(s) you are applying to and ask for a tentative schedule. Let them know you have a child and are just trying to get an idea of what kind of hours you'll be spending in school. Good luck, :) Ginyer

4-6 hours a day? I'm already in class from 9 am till 4 pm...I work almost 30 hours a week. I do maybe 4 hours of studying every saturday and sunday...during the week an hour or two a day max unless I have a test coming up. I'm borderline A/B student...I guess I'd be an A student if I studied like everyone else. I sure feel like a slacker now. If I have a test coming up, the three and four days before the test I will study about 6 hours a day. Everybody is so so different, I have classmates that ONLY study the day before a test and never read and make better grades than I do. I guess they absorb a lot more during lecture. good luck :) Ginyer

At our hospital the nurse tech and nurse externship (we call it an internship instead of an externship...not sure of the difference) are the same. The nurse externship student immediately starts doing the same skills as a nurse tech here because they have already been taught those skills in school so they assume the student already knows how to perform those skills. Our internship is done the summer before our last semester of nursing school. But the skills are the same as other people have listed...no meds, no IV's or anything considered complicated. The thing about our internships is that once we are hired we have to sign a contract to work for that hospital in that department as an RN for two years beginning as soon as we graduate from nursing school. So we have to make sure the internship is in an area we want to work. A nurse tech isn't guaranteed a nursing job in that department once they graduate from school. Sorry if all that is obvious information, I'm not sure how it's done elsewhere. Good Luck Ginyer

When I started nursing school I knew I wanted to go to graduate school and people kept saying, 'just worry about getting thru nursing school first' ... 'that's a long ways off and you have time to worry about that later' and it's all true but I think it's great to have a goal in mind that you're excited about. So while it's nothing to stress about now, you can be excited about it and use that energy to help you thru school. Also pertaining to the original question about going to med school, it was something I had considered for about a year before deciding to go to nursing school. Many of the classmates I've talked to said that they have always wanted nurses while nursing is something I would have said heck no to a few years ago but here I am and I love it. I can't say medical school doesn't cross my mind occasionally but nursing is the path I chose and I don't regret it for one minute. If I were you, I would go and volunteer at a local hospital. Tell them you're taking your pre nursing school classes. A hospital here has a special program for prenursing students where they rotate the volunteers around the entire hospital in almost every dept so they can basically observe. That should give you some concept of what a nurse is and does and possibly help you with your decision. Good luck :) Ginyer

I had heard that some hospitals required the nurses working in intensive care to wear hospital scrubs along with the OR. I'm a nursing student and I just applied for a tech job in the PICU at a hospital here so I was curious how it was other places. I guess I'll find out if I get the job. :) We'll see. Ginyer

Do you have to wear hospital provided scrubs? And if not can you wear whatever or do you have a specific color combo thats required? I realize it's different at every hospital, just curious. :) Ginyer

I feel that way every week. I usually eat junk food and mope around the house and sometimes even have a good cry for no reason in particular. I really do think you've just had this adrenaline rush all day and you crash. I think it's normal...I hope it is :) It goes away a day or two later. Ginyer

I'm about to finish my second semester of nursing school (and 2nd semester of clinicals) I think you'll be surprised by how you feel once you start your clinicals...I knew exactly what I wanted to do before I started school. Now I've only had two semesters of clinicals and while I'm leaning towards wanting to work in the NICU, I say 'I don't know' when people ask me. I don't think I'll know for sure until I have some exposure to it. Most of the students in my class feel the same way...we all started out knowing exactly what department we wanted to work in and now most of us have no idea. Hopefully once you go thru your clinicals you'll get a good idea but make sure to keep an open mind when you get started or you might miss out on something you would enjoy more. For example, my clinicals last semester were in telemetry which I thought I would hate and I loved it...this semester I'm in ortho/neuro which I thought I would enjoy and I'm not enjoying it at all. As posted in the earlier reply, voluteering is a really good idea. Most hospitals have programs for prenursing students where they alternate you throughout the hospital so you get a lot of exposure to different areas, mostly just observing but may even get a little hands on experience with some things. Also see if your hospital has 'cuddlers' in their NICU. After you volunteer for about a semester try getting a part time job as an aid in the area you're most interested in. Good luck! Ginyer PS do some research on this site...there are hundreds of very informative posts that will answer almost any question you may have as a student interested in the NICU

Thanks, I just ended up stating abdomen distended hypoactive bowel sounds x 4 tender on palpation in blah blah etc. ...I should have gone into more detail about it ... I think she just had bad gas though ... but i would think a lot of gas would give out some bowel sounds ... anyway thanks for the help, yes we get marked off for being too wordy ... the instructor is totally not impressed with my narrative notes so I'm really trying to work on that ... plus I make stupid mistakes on my charting, the one I turned in today (not real chart) I wrote the wrong date on every page and had to scratch and void, also the wrong AM BP and the wrong code number for the lung sounds I heard. I'm trying to pay attention so I don't look like a complete moron... :zzzzz I think I'm just really sleep deprived, but I guess aren't we all. Ginyer

In stating in my narrative notes that my pt has a distended abdomen...is 'abdomen distended' enough? When I informed my instructor she asked me why I felt it was distended and I explained how the skin was stretched and how it looked but I'm not sure if she was just making sure that I knew what a distended abdomen should look like or that I need to make sure I'm more descriptive in my notes...I mean I really feel like 'distended abdomen' explains itself...I go into more detail in these notes as a whole but I feel like I'm too wordy as it is, definately my biggest problem. Today was my fourth clinical day so it's getting better. Anyway, what do you think? thanks, Ginyer