MssNurse2b

Girls, I was just asking for your own experience with both methods of pain managements for your patients. Of course I will be the one who makes this decision, just my doctor's suggestion is only one person's opinion and I want to know all the facts before I make a decision.

Hi there, I am a future nurse, but right now I am going to be a patient and need some advice from experienced nurses. I want to thank in advance to everyone who will share their opinions. I will have a general surgery next week (distal pancreactomy and possibly splenectomy). The incision will be approximately 5-6 inches long. For pain management after surgery my doctor gave me two options - epidural or dilaudid with patient control. He was strongly suggesting the epidural, but I am just terrified of the idea of a needle in my spine. My biggest fear is paralysis (I know it is very rare, but it happens). I also heard that after epidural many women who gave birth started getting pain in their back from time to time as a side effect. The doctor told me that I will be able to walk with it and that it will only numb by abdomen, so I can be mobile straight after surgery. He also said that people who got it recover faster and don't experience as much pain as patients on regular pain killers. What do you think? Have you seen patients with epidural after general surgery? How did they recover? And how was the pain of those who decided to go with deluided? Will epidural really take all the pain away? I must say that it will be my first surgery ever, I've never been pregnant and I do have a low pain tolerance (I take pain killers even when I have my period). Which option do you think will work best in my situation?

I wanted to start this thread for awhile, and since today I am in a particularly bad mood, I decided it was definitely time to do so. So many times I've seen pre-nursing students starting topics here asking for advice regarding applying to nursing schools, competition, learning process, denials, challenges, difficulties finding a job, etc. And as a trend, I see lots of replies saying that all pre-nursing and nursing students should take their rose-colored glasses off and look reality in the face. They say that nursing is a bad career choice since the field is over-saturated, we will not find a job, everybody will treat us like crap and the pay is much lower than what we expect it to be. Now, I do understand that everybody have different experience and are probably trying to help, but some advises these people give leave me super puzzled. So many times they encourage us to choose another specialty like PT, OT, Pharmacist, PA, etc. Let me tell you something, ALL of these specialties require higher education = more years in school + more debt as a result. If you choose to go for PA, PT or OT you will have to have a Bachelor's degree before applying and schools usually require additional medical experience as well. These schools are extremely competitive, even more competitive than nursing. So, for many people, to get a Bachelor's in Science (aka in Microbiology, Biochemistry, etc.) and NOT to get into program will lead to limited career choices. What are you going to do with this degree if you don't get in? Work in a lab for 9$/hour? Well, at least no one will treat you like crap, right? In addition, many of these "better" jobs have lower demand than nursing (pharmacy, for example, is super competitive, the debt after school is astronomical and jobs are extremely hard to find). About other negative sides of the profession. Some say that doctors, PA's, patients and their families will treat you like crap and you will overwork yourself for the money you get. Give me an example of a profession in the medical field that will pay you the same as nursing with only Bachelor's degree, where everybody will treat you the way you deserve, the jobs will lay down in front of you and, in addition to that, you will not have to work hard for your money? Anyone? Every job will have its pros and cons, including nursing. I think it is a good career choice with great opportunities. To all of you who want to do it - go ahead! There is no "perfect job" nor "easy money". We all have to work for it and try to make the best out of the experience we get, unless you win a lottery and can afford helping people for free...

Endocrine in AP-1 was my hands down favorite! Liked cardiovascular this semester in AP-2 as well.

Well, that's just the way it is. And I think it is fair. A lot of students DO work and have 4.0 gpa. Others take loans with living expenses and repay after the are done with school. You will still have to pay your bills while in nursing school, but I don't think you will be able to work, maybe little part-time, but not full-time for sure. It is a competitive field, you knew that when you chose this route, right? Schools don't only look at gpa, test scores, essays and volunteering/working experience is a big factor as well. Schools accept mainly A students not only because they have a perfect academic record, but also because it shows they can handle the load of nursing classes, which are much harder than pre-reqs. It wouldn't be fair to accept student with a lower gpa, while leaving a straight A student behind, don't you think? Anyway, if you don't get accepted, you can always try to get into private school. They are more expensive, but they do offer various scholarships based on your academic achievements. It a long run, it will be better for you to repay bigger loan rather than waiting 2 or more years for a spot in the nursing program in public school.

what kind of schools are those? Counting classes in progress as C's can put a lot of applicants to the bottom of the list. And it does seem weird. It's not your fault you didn't get in, you have great stats.

Ok, you need to give us more info about your situation: 1. what is your GPA 2. do you have any volunteering experience? 3. are you considering only public schools or also private? 4. where do you live? 5. what about ADN in the community college?

The bones are not the hardest part, wait till you get to cardiovascular with its "wired men". For me personally, anatomy is the best part. I loved learning bones, muscles, heart, veins, etc. Physiology, on the other hand, is so much harder! I am a visual learner. Try to get a study group in college, so you will have someone helping you learn.

For my state I found all that info on Board of Nursing website. It has every school and program with passing rates as well as how many people took the test each quarter. However, you don't know how many people originally starter the program and how many were dropped along the way. This is a cropped file from BON website from my state.

Thanks for your comment, gpa is really something I need to consider (in terms of private school especially). I also wanted to ask if employers actually looking at our overall gpa after we finish nursing school? Or all they need is our license?

LadyFree28, thank you for responding, it was very helpful

I just googled it, very informative! Thanks)

Wow girls, reality is hitting hard.. After all your comments I start wondering who actually goes to private schools as what are they hoping for. Average 18$/hour? Are you serious? To be clear, I know nurses, but none of them I know close enough to ask about their salary. Who puts all this data on the websites about 65,000$ a year? I can make the same money working as a private caregiver without any additional education! I still want to get my degree since BSN will not be the end of it for me (MSN in the future), but I now will rethink my decision about private school

Using this calculator, my payment would be around 530$/month for 5 years (estimate of course). For 3 years the tuition will be around 27,000$

Thank you for your post. I will try to answers one-by-one 1. The job. As I stated before, it all depends on location. Where I live I know quite a few nurses (I volunteer at the hospital) and they all found the job easily. If I lived in, for example, Chicago, I imagine that it could be quite a task to find a job. Smaller cities - bigger chances. 2. Could you please explain the difference between community nursing and hospital? I asked this question before and got pretty much the same answers my advisor gave me (community nursing is more focused on low-income clinics, schools, colleges, etc., and I am not interested in that) I have only seen hospital nurses "in action" and have nothing to compare it to. 3. In the private school I was looking at, the scholarship is guaranteed as long as a student maintains 3.0-4.0 gpa. Medial salary for nurses is 65,000$/year. I think this amount will easily cover the loans 4. I just started receiving Pell grant last semester, so I am good as far as the time limit goes. Being married changes nothing, our income makes me qualified for Pell. If the financial situation changes and my husband starts making more, we will be paying out-of-pocket as much as we can, so I wont need to loan more money from the bank. The end of your post interested me the most. I was also concerned about pre-approved status of the program (although the collage advisor told me that the program got approved my BON and accredited by CCNE). I've heard that the programs only gets approved after the first batch of students graduate. Is that true for all colleges? Does it matter that they already have approval for ADN, MSN and BSN accelerated? Or new BSN is a completely different story? What happens it the NCLEX passing rate will be lower than 80%. I will appreciate if someone will share information on this subject.