utkayla

Following this because I too am in a nearly identical situation. Been in the OR for a couple years now and really wanting to expand my knowledge and take on new challenges but I'm not in a great learning environment. I'm pushing as much as I can to get scrub experience without stepping on toes, but man it's tough!!

OR nursing all the way! So many different opportunities and the best teamwork in the hospital

Hey there nurse friends, I have a question for all my OR people. I have worked in the OR for about 7 months now in a busy 20 room OR. Recently I have joined the heart team, which required additional training on top of my general orientation. Both scrubs and circulators have to go through additional training in order to do open hearts, and they take separate heart call, which is much more than general call since it is a smaller group of people who can do these cases. Since I began doing hearts, there has been a lot of discussion amongst the group about whether or not the heart team should be considered a specialty and thus be paid more. Most people have remarked that in other ORs it is a specialty, but I would like to hear from others about this topic. Are there specialties within your OR, and if so, are these staff members paid more for being trained to work in that particular service? Any other comments/opinions on your experience with this would be greatly appreciated.

I hadn't really considered school nursing before, but that does sound like something I might be interested in. I will certainly look into it. Thanks for the suggestion!

Thanks for the advice! Home health is definitely something I'm looking in to.

Hey Everybody! I have worked on an LDRP unit for 2 years and am considering a job change. I love my patients, but the hours and hospital management are starting to get to me. I'm trying to get ideas about what other careers options are out there for RNs with OB experience OUTSIDE of the hospital. Any suggestions you all have would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

I work on an LDRP unit and we are in the process of implementing bedside report. Like lots of things in nursing, I feel like it's great in theory but difficult to do in practice. The issues I'm having with it are, first, there are lots of things getting missed because we do a basic bedside report with the patient then have to discuss all the other "issues" outside the patient's room. So it feels as though we're having to give two reports on the same patient without "really" getting a thorough report. Second, even when I tell the patient ahead of time that I will be coming in at shift change to do report, I still feel like I'm waking/disturbing the patient unnecessarily at 7 am when they've been up all night with a new baby. Our manager is insistent that even if the patient is asleep we still should go in and update their boards, which inevitably wakes the patient up. I know it works on some units, but it just seems somewhat invasive and too lengthy to me without improving patient care.