mcleanstrong

Null, would you be willing to share where you did your post-masters DNP? I'm looking for something similar. Thank you! :)

Oy. Is it possible to delay your start time till January? Sounds like this is your first baby? Although you may have loads of help and backup plans, if it were me, I would give myself those first few months to adjust to life with a newborn. Sure, it's POSSIBLE, that you could push through the struggle and make it work, but at what cost? But then *I* don't function well with sleep depravation, so you have to evaluate whether you could keep up with the discussion board posts and whatever other assignments/papers you have during that semester. Personally, I would inquire to your program directly as to whether you could delay your start by a semester. 4 months out, you'd likely be in a much better position to manage school (physically, emotionally, psychologically, etc.). If it's possible to delay, I probably would, so as to better position yourself for success in starting your program. AND. You will have the rest of your life to multitask parenting with working/schooling. Take those first few months to just focus on your new role as a mom. :) But that's just my opinion. I'm sure there will be others who will say that they did it and so can you. Do whatever feels right to you, but don't underestimate the time and energy you will need during those first few months of motherhood. For credibility, I did my NP program while navigating a divorce and then raising a 3 and 1 year old as a single mom, and I can absolutely attest to the experience that external stressors/factors will have an impact on your school. Best of luck to you!

Thanks, Darth. I tried to PM you just now, but apparently you cannot PM anyone on this site unless you have a minimum of 15 posts, and I'm a bit short. :/ Thanks for your reply re: Chamberlain. I especially appreciate the analogy between ADN->BSN vs MSN->DNP. Would you mind if I emailed you a few questions I have, specific to the program? Thanks! Kate

Darth, did you happen to attend Chamberlain for your DNP? I was just online looking at the curriculum and noticed the "health systems leadership" language was the same as your post. If so, I'd love to get your thoughts on the program! Thanks, Kate

I had a similar decision as a new grad (in 2005): a choice between a smaller, community hospital close to home or a major medical center with a level one trauma center, research, unionized....the works. Ultimately I chose the smaller, community hospital and here are a few reasons why I'm glad I did: 1) There's something to be said for taking care of the people in your community. I work down the street from where I live, and I frequently have patients who are former teachers of mine, family members of my friends, neighbors, etc. This is a good thing, imho. 2) The commute is short. There's nothing like finishing a shift and being home and feet up on the couch within 10 minutes. 3) Since the hospital was smaller, it was easier for me, especially as a new grad, to figure out how everything worked. Who to call for what, how the place operated. More manageable, if you will. 4) Again, since working in my community, some of my co-workers have become my best friends and they live close as well. 5) Parking! Big hospital = parking garage or take a shuttle, would have to get there half an hour early to facilitate this. Small hospital = find a spot quickly and rush in to swipe your badge. :) The "bells and whistles" of Magnet, size, trauma center, etc. really had MUCH LESS to do with how happy I was in my position. What made the most difference were the people l interacted with on a daily basis, the environment/morale/mood of the unit, the support of the manager and administration, the nurse to pt ratio, and the patient population. Invest in these things and you won't go wrong. *Incidentally, the small community hospital I chose decided to go Magnet a few years in. It was a grueling process and guess what? It was the exact same place post Magnet as it was pre. They let the Magnet lapse after a few years, and we went back to non-Magnet status. Like I (and everyone else have) said before, it will impact your actual job wayyyyyyy less than you think it will. Take stock of what area you want to BE in. If your dream is to be an ED nurse, then it might be worth it to make the drive for a level 1 trauma center. But don't choose it just because it looks good on paper. Level 1 trauma won't mean much to you unless you're working in it. Hope that helps! As much as you can get onto the unit you are interviewing for, DO THAT. Watch the staff interacting. Ask different people questions (not just the manager). What's their turnover rate? Do they have tuition reimbursement? Put stock into the issues that will directly affect your life. Magnet won't.

Hey all! I could use a little direction here. I recently passed my ANCC FNP boards (YAY!) and now I could use a little help in getting my ducks in a row to begin practicing. I'm in talks with a few physicians to join on to their teams part-time. They are both privately owned practices and neither is sure of what paperwork needs to be in order for me to start practicing. I'm in Michigan, and the state BON said it would take about 6 weeks for me to receive my NP license. So when I receive my license, my understanding is that I need to apply for a bunch of things: NPI, DEA, CAQH. Also need to create a collaborative agreement with each physician/location I'll be practicing with. Malpractice insurance is probably going to be paid for by me. Any tips? Anything else I need to do in order to be ready for practice? This is difficult to navigate alone. Would be much easier if I were seeking employment with a hospital or a large group who had a dedicated person to help me with this. But such is life, I guess. Any tips would be much appreciated! Thanks!!

I can give you the opposite perspective, if that helps at all. I just finished an FNP program, and I went into it with almost 11 years of staff nurse experience (mostly telemetry & med/surg). I just took my boards on Tuesday (after being face down in a book for a few months) and I honestly feel like my staff nurse experience didn't help me get through school and pass my boards as much as I thought it would. I feel like inpatient and outpatient settings are such different beasts that, sure, I could identify an acutely ill patient in the office, but there is SO much outpatient and primary care information that you just do not see in the hospital setting. I haven't started working yet, so I may change my tune on that, but that's been my impression so far. I think you would be just fine as an FNP after having 4-5 years of nursing experience.

Hey Adam, I just finished an online FNP program. I live in Michigan and my school was based out of Colorado. All of my course work, lectures, case studies, discussions, tests, etc. were online and my clinical hours were to be arranged (by me) in the community in which I live. You might look into something like that because then you don't have to decide which state you want to live in (and practice in) before you start school. There are different certification exams for the different NP tracks. Here's the link to the ANCC website that lists each of the NP tracks you can take. ANCC Certification Center Michigan is a red state as well. I have a friend in Colorado, new NP grad, who is practicing independently. His salary is comparable to the NP salaries here, but he's in a really underserved community so I'm not sure how well that translates. Feel free to message me with any questions! Kate

Sounds like you're not the bad friend here..... *she* is. Asking you to jeopardize your own success to help her, guilt-tripping you into skipping your obligations, insulting your program as being easier than hers..... No. No. No. You are so thoughtful to be so considerate of her feelings and needs when she is obviously oblivious to yours. It sounds like this person is inevitably going to fail and instead of buckling down and putting the actual work in, she is looking for someone to blame for her failure. I didn't read all of the responses to this post, so much of this already may have been said, but I felt the need to comment that you seem like a really sweet person with a heart of gold. That will come in handy for your nursing career!

I just finished an FNP program and our program was very specific about what rotations we could have: internal medicine and family practice offices mostly. They would let us do a number of hours in a specialty outpatient clinic (cardiology office, derm office, etc.) and a number of hours in an urgent care. They would NOT let us do any hours in an ER because they considered it outside of our scope. So it seems they drew the line at urgent care: okay, ER: not okay for an FNP. I do believe it has a lot to do with where you live and what's currently being accepted in that area. I live in Michigan and I'll actually be signing on to an urgent care practice in the next few weeks. Employers are, at least in this area, getting more specific about hiring NPs that are staying within their scope (i.e. hospitals are only hiring Acute Care NPs). I'm not sure if that helped you at all, but that's been my experience. Feel free to message me with any other questions. :)

I have a few thoughts here.... Since it sounds like you'll be working during school, and it'll take you a few years before you complete all of the schooling for the NP, you'll be accumulating experience during that time. So it's not like you're gonna be an NP with no nursing experience. In my experience, age is not as big of a factor as you might think. Generally speaking, some of the most excellent healthcare providers (NPs, PAs, RNs, even physicians) have been on the younger side, and some of the ones I haven't cared for as much have been the older ones. I'm definitely not trying to discriminate against the older crowd, but my point is that younger doesn't necessarily have to equal bad. I think you can find or be a great practitioner at any age. I guess my question for you would be, do you know at this point what sort of NP you'd like to be? I know that's a struggle for people to identify early on, and the tracks are relatively specific. Plus, employers and state boards of nursing are getting more specific about NPs practicing within their scope, so hospitals (at least where I live in Michigan) are starting to phase out hiring FNPs in favor of Acute Care NPs. It makes sense, but in the past, employers haven't seemed to care as much about which specific certification you had, they just wanted to hire an NP. So I think now more than ever, you really have to have a clear vision of where you want to end up, or at least where you want to begin your career as an NP. You can always to back and take a few more classes to get another certification if you start out as an FNP and eventually want to do inpatient, or vice versa. I just finished my NP program (FNP) and took (and passed! yay!) my boards a few days ago. There are lots of things that I feel like I fumbled my way through that I wish had been made clear to me in the beginning. For example, I started out in an Adult-Gero Primary Care track but after one semester someone pointed out to me that if I ever wanted to work at an urgent care, ER, or even a family practice office that sees kids, that I wouldn't be hired because that track doesn't have a peds course. So I switched to FNP because I felt it had a more broad range for potential jobs after graduation. I worked in the hospital as a staff nurse for about 10 years, taught clinical in the hospital for a local nursing school for about 5, and I felt that I'd had my fill of hospital employment (at least for now). So good on you for being so motivated and knowing early on that you want to continue your education!! I hope you find the right track for you that takes you to where you want to be, but I wouldn't let your age stop you or make you hesitate if you know that's where you want to be. :)

Hi there! Just putting my $0.02 in here.... I have just graduated from a FNP program. I've been a nurse for about 10 years with most of my experience being on a med-surg/telemetry/progressive care unit. I also liked the action of codes and the adrenaline that came with it, but I'd had my fill of being a hospital employee for now, so I knew that I wanted to practice as an NP in the outpatient setting. Initially I chose the Adult-Gero Primary Care track, but after my first semester, someone mentioned to me that if I ever wanted to work in an ER or urgent care where there may be a pediatric patient, it would be wiser and more marketable to take the FNP route. So I switched. I'm glad I did, as I will likely end up in an urgent care to start. It sounds like you know that you want to stay inpatient, so for that reason alone, I would definitely take the ACNP route. It seems the trend is that employers and the boards of nursing within the individual states are starting to regulate more closely that NPs practice within the scope in which they were trained. I went to a Barkley live review course a few months ago, and he spent a great deal of time discussing practicing within your scope. He basically stated that as an FNP, yes, a hospital might hire you without a problem, but it's your license on the line if something happens and you were found to be practicing outside of your scope. For you, I would NOT take the FNP route just on the off chance that at sometime in the future, you *might* want to be outpatient. If you see yourself staying inpatient for the foreseeable future, I would start with acute care. Worse case scenario? You go back in a decade and do a post-master's certificate program in whatever it is you're interested in. My program was full of nurse practitioners who had obtained one certification and wanted to switch areas or wanted to be dual certified. Keep in mind you're not bound to stay wherever you start. You might need to take a few extra classes and rotations to switch patient populations and foci, but it's doable, and many do.