climberrn

Thank you for the replies. Sorry for the delay, I've been on my phone and hate posting from there. Sedatetime, that website is awesome, thanks for pointing it out to me. wtbcrna, those are all good criteria. Are these things I would find out on an interview or would it be good to talk to former/current students? Matthewrn, yeah the free tuition would be a no brainer for me too!

I'm in the enviable position of being able to apply most anywhere so I'm having a difficult time figuring out what my criteria are. Currently i have PICU experience ( 10 yrs.) so that limits me unless I get adult experience. Any particular schools that take just PICU? I'll get the adult if I need it but would rather not wait. Other than that, how did you start narrowing down your options?

Accepted to peds primary care focus, woohoo!

I could have sworn I replied.... Tammy79, thanks for all your research on costs! Unfortunately I'm looking for a program that's pretty limited (pediatric critical care NP) which has only a handful of programs, currently most are private universities, hence the elevated $$$$.

I mostly want to have information to present so I can convince my husband that I'll have a job after we pay 45,000 in tuition. By job forecast sites do you mean places like Monster?

I've been googling like a madwoman and I can't really find much on a projected demand for NPs. Does anyone have recent numbers from a reliable source?

This didn't seem to fit in the specialty threads but please move this if you need to. I'm in the process of applying to grad school, NP programs. In my research, many of them have a certain number of credit hours required, with a lesser number if you already have an MSN. Out of curiosity I started looking at general MSN programs and haven't really found that many (admittedly, it was a cursory search). Most say MSN but then have a focus of education, public health, or NP. Is there JUST an MSN program or is there always some extra focus?

A couple programs that I looked at (sorry, can't remember which ones) specifically excluded both ED and NICU as experience for CRNA.

I'd love to talk to you about your role, how you made the choice to do this instead of primary PNP, working with the docs, job security, etc., etc.

Suctioning not a sterile procedure? Really? That's definitely not how I learned it and not how I practice either.

Eh, I have a history degree I never used either and the $30,000 in loans that came with it. I'm definitely not alone either. In the grand scheme of things it won't matter. Yes, I hate that loan payment but I don't regret my first degree or the knowledge I earned with it. I just changed my focus and couldn't be happier. Do what you think you'll love, first 5 years be damned. Just my two cents. :)

Ugh, sorry you got the eye roll. I'll never understand why some nurses feel the need to bring their fellows in the trenches down. I'm wondering about something you said though. Many times, when I'm following a new nurse I'll ask a lot of questions about what they did and didn't do, more to put it on their radar. There's only so many situations you can encounter in orientation so I try and bring up things that they might not have seen. I'm definitely not doing it to be a b*tch. Any chance there was some of that going on?

Our facility uses different concentrations so I would not go with 'it's always x, y or z mcg/cc'. It will vary depending on your facility, on your doctor, on the patient's condition (do they need to have their gtt concentrated or diluted differently?). Get used to checking what the concentration is at the beginning of every shift and use the formula given by the other posters. It gets easy fast. :)

I vary. If I don't know them very well I'll call them Dr._____. If they've introduced themselves with their first name I'll do that or once I get to know them. I will call them Dr_____ in front of the patients though.

I didn't read that as Zookeeper saying it was a conscious sedation drug, I read it as like conscious sedation drugs, you need to be in a 1:1 ratio until it wears off. That being said, like the other posters I've only seen it given either as a gtt on a already intubated patient or immediately prior to intubation with a doc.

I've worked both PICU and NICU and depending on what level nursery the NICU is, it might not be that critical. Once the babies are about 27-28 weeks, they are critical for a very short time. After that brief window your job is to get them to their "birthday" so they can go home. Obviously this is a generalization and you have to know your stuff so you can get them there but it's not that exciting. If you are truly wanting critical care you'd definitely want a level III nursery that can take micro-premies and that does hearts. So it just depends on what you want. If you want the excitement of critical care, with lots of pumps, drips, patients "circling the drain" you'll probably want adult CC (lots of co-morbidities means sick, sick patients). If you want those things but with maybe a better chance of survival, PICU is your gig (kiddos bounce back like crazy). If you want some CC with time to really know your patient over weeks and months with some "exciting" stuff but lots of TLC, NICU could be your goal. Good luck!

As a general rule workplace relationships are a no-no but that's pretty much only if it ends or ends badly. Since you are both planning on leaving I'd say keep up what you've been doing, keep it discreet and don't give anyone anything to gossip about. As for me, I "bagged" my doc husband when he was a fellow and I was an RN in the PICU but he says he "bagged" me...all depends on your frame of reference. I think the main thing is keeping it out of work. One of the highest compliments I received was that people couldn't tell we were dating or engaged because we kept it that professional.

So my husband and his partner started a PICU in a community hospital. I'm a PICU RN and work there part-time. When he gets paged, I can hear most of the conversation and some of it just blows me away. Doc: So, what rate is the vent on now? RN: 27 doc: okay, let's take the rate to 25 and the peep to 7 RN: okay 5 minutes later, a page from the RN: Um, doc, I messed up, I was looking at the wrong page of charting. The rate is actually 21. Doc: okay, take the rate to 19 then. Wait, what are the pips? Pips. Peak inspiratory pressures. It's on the right side, top.... Um, you, the RN have ONE patient! How do you not know everything about that patient? How are taking care of a vented patient and not know the mode, PIP, what PIP is, for goodness' sake???? Another nurse put a CaCL gtt through a peripheral IV when the central line clotted off. Guess who's going for reconstructive surgery later? The lack of knowledge just amazes me. Am I off in thinking PICU nurses should know these things? Vent over.

That's what I do for most of my stuff anyway. I just don't get the hospital's priortizing. Hmmmm. Ceftriaxone or epi? six of one...:icon_roll PM on it's way. Thanks!

Our problem (as denoted by pharmacy) is that since we aren't a children's hospital, they have to load drugs for all age groups and there is a limited amt of data that can be loaded. Additionally, they've chosen to load drugs like ampicillin/ cefotaxime, lasix etc. etc. Thus leaving less room for drugs like oh, say, epi or neo. (are you hearing the sarcasm? ) I may have to become a one woman crusade.

We use syringe pumps but we also have bags of drugs mixed. Our concentrations are either 4 mcg/cc or 64 mcg/cc. The former can end up with giving way too much volume, the latter has been resulting in the aforementioned swings in BP. I'm wondering if we need to put all pressors on syringes. Then the problem becomes that if that isn't loaded into the syringe as an option, we're off "guardrails" and the hospital freaks.

So the syringe pumps don't have that same delivery system? It makes sense but I never thought of it that way. Do you have a policy about it? I'd love to look at it...it's starting to be a big problem.

We use them here and the patients on them seem to have wicked labile blood pressure that I never saw when pt's were on gtts made with rule of 6's (my other 2 hospitals). Anyone else seen this? It's mostly been a problem with our babies to 2 years, not so much older kids.

I do agree that charting circumference, redness, etc. is more useful but you're not making a DX by charting Homan's (regardless of it's usefulness), you are reporting + or -, that's it. No CYA involved...

I thought your vent was pretty funny. I used to tease the docs on our floor if they were being snippy: "Be nice to me or you're gonna get a 3am tylenol call...." *winks* Had some pretty bad docs but none to the point of the one of 40/palp wait til morning rounds. Skeery!