Greenclip

Welcome ? Expect pay to be lower than you're used to, unless you're coming from the rural South. I think there isn't a bad place to work in the Lou unless you're looking at Kindred or Select, which don't apply to you. BJC gives expert pay in some a...

We have a tech. Our larger (16 bed) ICUs will sometimes have two techs, which is really nice. Blood sugars and baths are their main tasks. Nurses get all vitals and manage Foley output. The techs also help with turns and help to set up the rooms for ...

Other parts of the US pay far less. Where I live, a nurse with 3 years of experience makes about what you do.

Interesting. My experience was that the questions in Barron's were very close to what was on the test. Pass CCRN was helpful for having more practice questions, but as you said, many of questions were more in depth than what was on the test.

Upon admission and once per shift. We are also supposed to do it if the patient has been off the unit for more than 2 hours (for example, coming back from surgery).

Sorry. I'm still stuck on the part where you are in Missouri and make $43.70 an hour. I was going to say where in the world, but where in the state can you do that? I haven't seen salaries like that in the KC or StL areas. The ICU nurses I know at th...

No call. Our unit educators have taken patients maybe twice in two years (critical care areas). Both times have been for only a few hours, until more staff nurses could come in.

I agree 100%. I found the NCLEX easy. It can't possibly assess the critical thinking capacity of a new graduate nurse. I don't even think it assesses knowledge very well. I passed with 75 questions; I know that 15 of those were test questions. Theref...

The first one sounds like med-surg, maybe "complex med-surg" and the second one sounds like stepdown. At the big academic hospital where I work, several of the stepdown units are one big room with beds divided by curtains.

In our ICU, many nurses go there intending to stay for no more than 2-3 years because their real goal is to become an NP. For this reason, there is no incentive to get CCRN. 75% of attrition in our ICU is from NP grads.

We use a fitted sheet and a large blue absorbent pad (cloth, not paper) as our standard. We use the blue pad as a draw sheet to turn patients. We have superb skin outcomes. Patients at high risk for skin breakdown get different treatment, including a...

I really don't think it would help your chances. If you get hired into an ICU, the unit will pay for you to take the ECCO program. The program isn't meaningful without the clinical experience to go with it. It's designed to help you assimilate and un...

I have never heard of a hospital/health care system that did not cap nursing hourly rates. We are capped at a level FAR lower than yours. I couldn't dream of making money like that (I assume that in the NY metro area you need every penny of it).

In our older patients we see UTI and pneumonia as the most common factors behind sepsis. Other causes are much less common. Regardless of cause, older patients and immune compromised patients are much more likely to present with sepsis. Our docs star...

The test will NOT show you a 12-lead printout, although you may have a question which shows a simple strip. But you will have questions which expect you to know the significance of elevations in groups of leads. I echo what has been said above.

A new grad going into PACU? Wow. That would be a very steep learning curve. Read through past threads for the last several years (that actually won't take too long, many threads are short or repeat the same questions). Lots of good advice in there. ...

Drain's is fantastic. Both of these books are available in current or previous editions on many sites. Check Ebay, Amazon used listings, etc.

That looks like coarse flutter to me. Yes, I've had at least two patients who had rates in the 30s and were completely asymptomatic. Both men. Good for you for being curious and asking questions!

We change the needleless connector/clave every 7 days. I have never heard of changing it after a blood draw. Our policy for blood cultures, though, if we're drawing off a central line, is to either draw directly from the hub or to put on a new connec...

The PACU nurses have a signed handoff report that is completed electronically when a nurse hands over a patient within the PACU, whether it's a permanent handoff (the first nurse doesn't expect to care for the patient again, for whatever reason) or a...

We have that in our PACU but not in our ICU.

Two shifts in is way too soon to judge. Give yourself a little time. You won't have every shift with her, and if your orientation is anything like ours, you'll have some time doing critical care modules and other classes. In other words, your brain w...

My PACU bays have three walls. Only the isolation bays have doors that can close. The bays are really not big enough, however, for visitors. I agree with Rose_Queen, above. Patients are really out of it for most of the time they are in PACU. Recently...

There are lots of threads on this topic, if you scroll through. I and many others would agree that Pass CCRN is a great resource, but perhaps not the best test prep. The questions did not accurately reflect the exam. I recommend Barron's CCRN Review ...