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I can't even fathom 7:1 on med surg without an aide on days. I wouldn't feel safe. The hospital I work med surg is 4:1 days. The hospital scores very well on safety. It is hard but doable. I worked med surg 1.5 years full time and now I work per diem. I like the hospital I work for, hard but I could never see them trying to shove 7 patients onto an RN.

I did 2.5 years of liberal studies prior to getting into nursing school. My ADN program was 2 years. I'm now going part time toward my bachelor's. I worked during school. I work as a nurse now on med surg. I have a 14 year old that I homeschool. I genuinely believe that it takes time and effort to get what we want out of life. The only "depressing thing" is that people don't recognize how much work us nurses have to do to become nurses and then all the real life experience learning that takes place after you graduate...wow.

Taking a blood sugar is nursing judgement. If your patient has signs and symptoms of hypo or hyperglycemia then I would take the blood sugar. I would document the rationale. I would also call the doctor and question why the patient isn't on blood sugar checks. Maybe it was an oversight? I work in a hospital. I also think that you have to consider, if I don't take the blood sugar what could happen? If someone has low blood sugar and you do nothing or high blood sugar and you do nothing? Then it comes down to what is most safe and logical.

I work on med surg. I do a full head to toe twice a day and focused assessments if something seems different. I usually have four patients; sometimes five. I'm new to the profession. I even do it on "psych" patients. If they're there for a medical reason, they need to have a complete head to toe. Period.

I'm in my first year of nursing. I work med-surg. Most days, I like it. I may be stressed but I still like being a nurse. Yesterday, was NOT one of those days. I am having stress at home and that doesn't help. I was not feeling well and unfortunately, when you work around other nurses, no amount of makeup can cover up you're not well. I've been getting last minute admits; like 20 minutes before I'm supposed to give report to leave. I don't like myself when I'm stressed. I don't like the way I feel or the things I say in head or out loud. I just want to be the person I am/ know myself to be. I'm type a. I try to be meticulous in my work. But yesterday, my patient load was "light" after I did a d/c but I also had one patient that involved a lot of my time. So how do you handle this kind of stress??? I'm just about at my wit's end at home as it is and I am in school for my BSN so I don't get a lot of time to be fine at home. I don't know how much more I can take at home but I do try to be positive esp. at work.

I wouldn't want you to be my nurse or my family member's nurse.

Can't work as an aide if you have your rn. You are not an aide anymore. At least you can't in Maine.

People can roll cigarettes too, just sayin'. Not that it really matters.

Was the delivery successful when you did the trick? If so, sounds like you passed! :)

I answered 1056 questions. 66.4% were correct. 33.6% incorrect. Strongest subject was labs and weakest was pediatrics. I passed NCLEX-RN on June 9th with 75 questions. I didn't use the nclex mastery app alone to prepare.

I just wanted to update, the pop up works. I checked my BON site and I am listed as active registered nurse!!! Good luck to everyone waiting!

If the original poster is working as a cna still (last activity was on those boards), why is this post up? Sounds like the trick was right...

Okay, so I took mine today. It was really hard. Lots of challenging questions. Things I had never heard of. By the end of the exam, I felt like I was answering questions correctly but they were still very hard; required a lot of thinking. Anyway, it shut off at 75 and I sat there shell shocked. I tried the "trick" as soon as my delivery was successful. My pop up has everything except contacting a board member. I will pay for the quick results when I can. I'm super stressed. I see other people got it and passed without anything about contacting a board member. Just how accurate is this "trick?" STRESSED. LOL. Oh I wanted to edit that I also got that email from Pearson. Is that an indicator of anything or is it just to tell you how you can get your results early? Thoughts?

Our grade scale has anything in the way of a B ending at 83. Needless to say, I got many a C+ and I was very happy to do so. I wouldn't call anyone in my nursing program a slacker; even those that didn't make it. Nursing school was hard.

This advice bothers me. I'm not saying that the original poster doesn't have to deal with the consequences of what happened; but life happens. Alarm clocks don't work sometimes; keys get locked out of cars, etc. I have less than a month of nursing school left and it is very disheartening how nursing students can be treated sometimes. Nursing is supposed to be a caring and compassionate profession! Granted, yes, it is a profession so we have to own up when we make mistakes but the compassion is so often lost! Original poster: this is a hard situation you are in now because of what happened; but don't give up. Try your best. It is better to have tried than to just give up because of ONE mistake.

The nurses on all my clinical experiences have been wonderful. I agree about not going to them for every little thing. Also, nurses have a lot of responsibility, as a student, my role was to learn and lighten the work load for them and the cna as much as I could. That's what I thought. Also, it was reiterated to us several times to help where we can as much as possible. That means answering call bells, even if we don't know the patient or we might not be able to get that patient what they need, the person could really have something serious or it could be something as simple as getting them a drink. Once again, I've had only positive experiences with all the nurses at my clinical sites! :)

$750 a credit hour is absurd. I pay $86 a credit hour in my adn program. Once I finish, the online program I am looking at is $300 a credit hour. It is accredited and the last year of your bsn, you can switch out electives and take nursing classes toward your master's. They also have a matriculation agreement with my college.

I'm not sure how it will work out in the long run for myself. I just wanted to add that some C+ to B students have test anxiety. If the pressure is off, I perform much better in a testing situation. I'm in a difficult program. My original clinical group went from 8 to 3 by the end of our third semester. But I digress, I always score high on the end of semester HESI; usually above 90%. My last score was 968. I'm lucky to make 80s on our semester tests. I'd like to go to grad school. We'll see what happens. My point is, that each person is an individual. We all have our own struggles. My personal life got crazy right before I started nursing school in 2012. I just keep plugging along doing my best. I try not to compare myself to other people in the program. A letter grade does not necessarily demonstrate knowledge. I think, as women (since the profession tends to be dominated by us), we tend to compare ourselves in absolutely everything. Best not to compare; do your best and not worry about what someone else is doing. Everything, including bad test grades, happen for a reason. Can't get into the grad school of choice? Do what someone else wrote and make it happen or choose something else.

Being a nurse and being overweight are not necessarily related. Try putting into a calorie burn calculator just how many calories are burned on a 12 hour shift. As I stated before, eating more calories than you need for your body is how you become overweight. I'm a cna and have never worked as hard as I do now at any job. And if we're going to play numbers the CDC states that 69.2% of Americans over the age of 20 are overweight. That means, less nurses are overweight when compared to the average American populous. Therefore, your point is moot. Jobs don't make you overweight. Bad habits do.

I'm not sure if being a cna before nursing school helps with nursing school. I work as a cna per diem and worked full time this summer between my first and second year. I'll graduate with my adn this May. I think working as a cna has helped me tremendously. I used to be scared of answering call bells, working with male patients, etc. Now it is like second nature and although I work very hard physically I love being a cna most of the time. I also got experience with hoyers and sit to stand lifts as well as colostomy care. It's been valuable experience for me. Oh and I wanted to add that it has helped with time management skills! I used to have trouble with getting just one patient ready for the day in clinical first semester. Now, I am responsible for at least 7 and have had as many as 16 (night shift).

I'm doing a lot of the same things others have posted. I've been working as much as possible. I'm a cna in LTC. I've been reading some for next semester but think I will start doing notes too. Volunteering is a good idea. I have a 13 year old and have been spending time with her, cleaning the house, watching netflix. I'd like to pick up a good book to read. I'm off until 1/21/2014. I work on Christmas stockings and sell them so I'll probably start one of those soon especially if I don't get as many hours at work as I'd like. :) I graduate in May.

No, it is not. This comment is ignorant. You eat more than your body needs to function, that is how you become obese. I have known many nurses who are not overweight.

If you do not have compassion or humility, all the lecture and clinical experience in the world doesn't do you any good if you tell a sick person to say "please" before you will get them a blanket. People like that should not be nurses.

A 15 pages report for your unknown? Yikes. I loved micro; took it this summer between my 2nd and 3rd semester in nursing school. It was 7 weeks. We had an unknown in lab but my report was 5-6 pages, if that.

This is the old nature versus nurture argument. We have not proven that either are definitive. I think it is best not to pigeon hole people. Also, it is rather condescending to those that went to trade school to imply that their skills aren't complicated. There once was a time when nurses were looked on in the same way; in some places still are. I would tread the water very carefully on this one.