FutureRN2005

I cant really help w/ L&D M/B or NICU questions since I have never worked in these areas. But I did go through the ER residency program upon graduation, and can share some info about piedmont overall. All the nurses wear any combination of navy blue and/or white scrubs. As far as I know there is no onsite childcare. I would not hesitate from the piedmont scholarship program because you are worried about having to sign a 2 year contract. Because with most (not all, but most) hospitals will have to sign a contract anyways with your residency if you choose to do a residency in a specialty area. And I have found that piedmont will work with you with the contract. For example, if you take a job in L&D and find you dont like it ,you can change areas as long as you work at piedmont for your 2years. Overall, I think its a good place to work, and they pay above avg for the area, and most units you dont have to work any weekends because of the baylor program. I felt the residency was pretty good, I felt prepared to work in the ER when my residency was over. Hope this helps.:)

I found it was best to apply in person. Go to the HR office and ask to speak with a nurse recruiter. Almost all of the hospitals in atlanta have new grad residency programs.

I am in the same situation. After graduating I worked about a year and a half in the ED, which I love most of the time. But I never quite feel comfortable with the critical patients. Thankfully we have a good team, and you always have help with those pts. But I still feel like unless I do some time in the ICU, I will not fully understand the how's and the whys with critical patients. I have decided to get some ICU experience and am going to work prn in the ED.

I work in Piedmont Er and Im sure that there are several openings right now. So I think you will hear something soon. Good Luck.

Georgia participates in quick results so, 2 business days after you take your boards you can check w/ pearson vue online or by phone to get your results. it takes 2-4 weeks for it to be posted on the BON website.

Im sorry that you are having such a rough time, but it helps me a little to read these posts and see that I am not alone. Having a good preceptor can really make or break you. My problem right now is that I feel as if I am being tossed between different preceptors every shift. I have an excellent preceptor, but since she has been out I have been with whoever is available and it has gone from bad to worse. I have made some silly simple mistakes, nothing to cause anyone any harm. But then I come home and spend all my time dwelling on everything I should have done differently and wondering how I am ever going to manage when I am on my own. I just keep thinking things have got to get better....

My suggestion would be for each student to have his/her own personal list of things you want to work on during your preceptorship and share this with your preceptor at the begining of clinicals. Also it helps if you can be paired up with a nurse who likes to teach and wants to be a preceptor. :)

I took Hurst Review and I loved it. I passed NCLEX on 1st time w/ 75 questions. The review is 4 days and covers med/surg, ob, and psych and you get a 5th day dvd that had mgmt/delegation and pediatrics. Marlene makes learning the test strategies really amusing so you dont forget them. she also breaks down things into simple terms. You also get a cd with a mock NCLEX with rationales to take at home. The cd also has all kinds of useful stuff like lab values, and other basic reference things you can print out and study. Hope this helps.

Also just found out that I passed today!! Congrats to everyone else who found out the good news. And good luck to those of you still waiting for results.

Just took the NCLEX this am. Since no one has anything positive to say after the test I am not going to talk about the test. I would just say for the day before your test stop studying and just relax. It really is the best advice. But if it helps I also took Hurst review and made about 70 on the mock NCLEX and I think I scored in 60-70's on Kaplan. Most of the people I have talked to did about the same and passed. So I am hoping it works for me too. Good luck to you.

Just try to keep a positive outlook. I am in the same boat. Also took NCLEX this am and I am in so much stress. I dont know how i will make it through the next 48hrs. All my friends and classmates assume that I will pass. But I just dont know. I had 75 questions, mostly teaching, and I also felt like I didnt know anything. It really seemed like all of my studying didnt help. But I am trying to keep positive. Hopefully its a good thing that the questions were so hard we felt we didnt know anything. If they get easy then I think that means you are getting them wrong. Im praying for both of us. Hopefully we will both be RN's very soon.

My suggestion is not to wait. If you want to work in a "specialty area", many times they only will hire a limited number of new grads. I graduated in Dec. and waited until nov. to apply and caused myself alot of unnecessary stress. By the time i applied most of my classmates had offers already because they applied early. Good luck to you!

The last question determining whether you pass/fail was also a myth. Because this can also be one of the pilot questions and not even count. The thing they emphasized to us was that you must get more questions right than wrong to pass. Good luck to you.:)

I dont think that is anything to worry about. I just attended a week long NCLEX review course and on the last day they went over several "myths" about the NCLEX. One of the myths was that the computer figures out your weak areas and you get more questions in that area. That is not true. Also, 15 questions are pilot questions - so some of the questions you had on the same topic might not have even counted. Another myth they discussed was that if you get the last question right/wrong it determines whether you pass/fail. A lot of priority questions is a good thing since these are supposed to be the higher level questions. So relax, and good luck to you. I will be testing at the end of the month.

Apply early! Don't make the same mistake I did. I just graduated in december 2005 and I did not begin to apply untill the begining of november thinking that with so many nursing jobs out there I would not have any problems. Silly me. Most specialty areas only accept a limited number of new grads. Even if they have plenty of open positions in that area. And the spots fill up quickly. I found myself wishing that I had applied earlier like others did. Oh well, good luck to you.

Just out of curiosity what area do you work in? Maybe a change to a lower stress area (if such a place exists ) within the same hospital would help. That way you would still probably make the same salary and maybe a different environment would work out better for you. Good luck to you.

I know just how you feel. There is not one day when I go to work and some one does not say something like: You look like you should be in high school. And I am not even that young. I am 27 and when I finish nursing school, it will be my 2nd bachelors degree. I am already worried what it will be like when I finish school. I feel like I must really know my stuff to prove myself.

I feel the same way. It seems like everyone has their job lined up. We only have 4 weeks untill graduation. I am so excited to finally be here, but I feel like I am the only one who hasn't gotten my plan together for post graduation. Well, I have finally gotten on it and will hopefully have some interviews comming up soon.:)

Its just not practical. I am a nursing student and I work as a tech. I know how to do manual vitals, and when I am at clinical with my 1 to 3 patients and all the time in the world I take them manually. But when I work as a tech and am responsible for a whole group of patients (9-15) I just dont have time. The dynamap allows you to take bp, pulse, temp, pulse ox all on one machine, in seconds. It usually takes almost an hour to take vitals using the machine, because everytime you go in a room someone needs something (water, help to bathroom, needs to be cleaned, etc...). So I could imagine how long it would take taking each set of vitals manually. Now if it comes up abnormal- sure, I go get my stethescope and take it manually. But I would think as a nurse, if a tech came to me with abnormal vitals from the machine, I would want to recheck them manually myself. Why would I rely on the tech when there is a potential problem and I might have to give drugs based on this or call the doctor, etc.? I have heard of techs making up vitals and some will just tell you that they retook it manually. I would not want to risk my patient or my liscence that I am working so hard for. just my opinion though. :wink2:

Hang in there. I am also getting ready to begin my last semester in 2 days. And I was in the same boat you are in. Previously I would get so nervous about clinicals that I wouldnt get any sleep the night before. I also feel like I am missing skills that I just have not had the opportunity to practice in clinicals. But most nurses tell me that you will really learn what you need to know after school as far as skills go. And that I will get to do alot more during my up comming preceptorship this semester. So I wouldn't worry about the skills too much. As far as not liking bedside care... Is there any area that you liked in school and could maybe see yourself doing? Even just long enough to get some experience under your belt. Because there is so much you can do with your nursing degree besides bedside nursing. Good Luck :)

I think it depends on where you work as to whether it is worth it or not to get your PCT. At one hospital I worked at PCT's and CNA's did the same job but PCT's got payed a little more money. But there is definately a demand for PCT's and CNA's. From my own experience and classmates who also work as PCT's, I have found that the pay in the atlanta area is anywhere from 9.00/hr to 12.50/hr for day shift. (a little higher on nights and weekends.) Good Luck.

Our school does the ERI testing after each semester. The ERI also serves as our exit exam. You have to make the national average to graduate. From what the seniors in our class have told me, the ERI (exit exam) is much worse than NCLEX. They said that once they passed the ERI, state boards was not nearly as bad. So I wouldnt worry about ERI too much, especially if you are scoring at the national average. :)

Our class meets in our University's clinical center where's there's patient simulators, heart and lung sound stuff etc. and also patients are seen there (I don't know if we will see these patients?). The class is called "Health Assessment and Nursing Therapeutics" -- would this be considered my first semester of "med-surg"? Nothing in my program is actually called that.. the reason I'm asking is because I hope to work as an extern after my 2nd semester and most hospitals require 2 semesters of med-surg.. In my second semester I will have 2 clinicals, one psyc and another Acute Nursing Care of Adults and Older Adults". I wish they would just give them simpler names and actually tell us what we were doing! sounds like your program is like ours. If it is, the Health Assessment and Therapeutics does not count as med surg. Its where you learn your basic skills, and how to do an assessment, etc....When most hospitals say they want you to have so many semesters of med- surg to work as an extern they usually mean your acutal clinicals. Hope this helps.

I will be doing my preceptorship in the fall and based on what I have heard from others I would suggest :Emory, Crawford-Long, St. Josephs. It really depends on what area you are interested in also - Northside is the spot for OB, Egelston for peds, and Grady or Atlanta Medical for trauma. Hope this helps :)

I felt the same way my first year of clinicals. I would not be able to sleep the night before, and after clinicals I felt down, even though nothing went wrong. I dont know what year in school you are in, but my second year I feel so much better about clinicals. I am even excited about doing my preceptorship in the fall. So hopefully things will get better soon.