NavyVet

Baths! Ugh. Hate them with a passion. We bathe all of our vented patients at night as well, and that is usually when shtf around here. Patient is doing fine, I'm getting the vasopressors titrated down, vitals are looking good....I give a bath and bam! O2 sats down, bp tanks, afib rvr....pretty much anything that can go wrong usually does. Baths kill people ;P

I guess I fall into the Young'ins with phones category, though I don't see any problem with it under certain circumstances. Nurses station at 3 a.m., charting and patient care work done? I'll take a look at yahoo and catch up on the news. If I wasn't doing that, then I'd just be sitting around bs'ing with the rest of the staff at the nursing station as we struggle to stay awake. Either way, nothing of any importance is being done during the down time, so I may as well entertain myself. No different from looking at the internet on the computer, reading a magazine/book, or conversing with your co-workers about your weekend plans or talking about how great your kid is doing in school. I always follow proper cell phone etiquette, phone on vibrate, never out in patient care areas, etc. I have used it to look up a drug on the fly, or a medical condition I wasn't familiar with as well. PDA phones are tools just like guns are, nothing inherently wrong with either, just with people using them improperly. ymmv.

Hiya my4helpers, I graduated from Aultman College of Nursing and Health Sciences last May. It's an associates degree program here in Canton, Ohio. Aultman hospital provides the clinical sites and most of the general education classes are contracted through Walsh University. As I mentioned previously, the tuition is pretty pricey, @$410 or so a credit hour, very overpriced in my opinion when compared to a community college option. The upside of the higher tuition is that I was able to start immediately and graduate in 2 years, versus the community college running a 2 waitlist just to start the nursing portion of the degree.

I realize some consider it crass to discuss/compare wages, but if you don't know what others are making, its tough to determine if you are being fairly compensated. I live in Ohio, outside of any major cities, and hired on a few months ago and got the minimum starting RN wage of $24 base (we're union, so its easy for me to see what the wage steps are in the hospital, I know I got the lowest). I was/am a new grad with no prior healthcare experience. This is the way the system is supposed to work. If wages are being negotiated based on how attractive they are, or their gender, or because they are buddies with a higher up, then things are messed up and its time to look for a new employer. If a new grad is being hired in at the same rate as a 10 year veteran is making....then its time to resign and find an employer who appreciates you.

Caliotter3 makes a very good point here, if you can afford to work as a CNA or patient care tech, you will have a big leg up over other job seekers on your resume. I really wish I would have listened to this advice when I was a student, but I was sheltered in my little academic world and believed employers would be lining up to hire me, so I chose to not work as a CNA. Doing CNA work was beneath me, I was going to be an RN! Well, that hubris and naivety cost me dearly when job hunting with no experience. Five months of job searching cost me @$20k in lost potential income.

I had this same problem transitioning from the military, with a career focused on mechanics and engineering. I had no other experience to include on a resume, so I used my military positions. I emphasized the increased levels of responsibility and leadership I took on, education received and awards earned. My point being, just because a previous job had nothing to do with healthcare doesn't mean you didn't learn something from it and grow as a person. When submitting resumes, there often isn't an option of submitting a second 'non-nursing' resume. You will have to provide a complete resume when you submit your application. Try to highlight things you learned or did, organizational skills, customer service, teaching, leadership, etc. A resume is just a tool to get you an interview, if your resume is weak, or missing information, you won't even get a call back from HR these days. I was actively seeking any and all RN positions for 5 months, I got 2 interviews. I was extremely lucky to get the position I did in Rehab, far down on my list of 'exciting' jobs but I'm happy to be working nonetheless. There were 200 people who applied for the job I got, and that was just the cutoff point from the hiring manager telling HR to stop sending applications. Hope that helps some! Positions for New Grad RN's are tough to come by pretty much across the U.S. right now. See the First Year in Nursing board for how rough the hiring environment is currently.

Ya, my humor tends to run to sarcasm, but its all in good fun. For the record, my wife is an RN as well and over the same 10 year period, she had 1 ticket for not buckling her seatbelt (while driving through a parking lot!) and zero accidents. I forgot to mention that I also hit a guardrail pulling a U-turn with my lights off to avoid a police roadblock/DUI checkpoint (licensed was suspended for unpaid speeding tickets at the time). This happened on our first date. I have never been able to win a "Girls are crappy drivers" argument in my house, for some reason she likes to throw my 'youthful indiscretions' in my face . I think its terribly rude of her to use facts to defeat my attempts at stereotyping and slandering her gender!

I'm sorry to hear your plight Grumpy. Sadly, the manufacturing jobs are all leaving our state and many people are feeling the pain. I don't know what your educational background is, or your feelings/desire/financial ability to go back to school are, but I believe it would be tough to support say a family of 4 on STNA wages. I got out of the military and went to school for my RN associate degree. Two years of school and $20k later and I have my degree making $27 an hour (base of $24). I also live in Northeast Ohio, Canton area to be precise. Nursing is not for everyone, there are some tough general education courses to do and I've seen many a person crying after a particularly hard week and a course failed by less than 1%. However, at the end of the day, I find this profession to be very rewarding and enjoyable with so many different paths to personal fulfillment, that I find myself recommending it to everyone looking for a career change. In my previous career, I was a gas turbine mechanic working on jet engines, electrical generation, hvac, hydraulic, pneumatic and propulsion systems in the Navy. You could always work as an STNA while attending school, but it can be rough. STNA's get a lot of the more labor intensive work for the least amount of pay in the healthcare field, while RN's tend to be responsible for more of the overall picture stuff, assessments, meds, critical thinking aspects of patient care. This is by no means a slight to Nurse Aides, they truly can make a shift run smoother and provide another set of eyes on the patient and bring to the nurses attention things they may have missed on a busy shift. RN's also end up doing a share of the back-breaking labor too, it just seems to fall on the aides more often. BTW, school doesn't have to be as expensive as it was for me, I just wanted to get into and through a program quickly and took out student loans to pay for it. If you have any specific questions related to local RN programs, job outlook, hiring, career paths, loans/grants for your situation or what have you, feel free to ask or PM me. I just went through this process and graduated in May 2009 so its still fresh in my mind. Good luck to you sir.

I can't believe no one has connected the dots on this one.... From Minoritynurse.com (I cannot vouch for accuracy of statistics, but the ballpark numbers sound about right), there are @ 2.9 million licensed registered nurses in the U.S., of which @ 168 thousand are men (@6%). The nursing profession is bound to be on that worst driver list with a predominantly female base , there aren't enough of us guys to counteract all you bad driving women! I'm surprised we're not #1! Well now we have a goal as a profession . Never mind my personal 10 speeding tickets, 1 accident, 1 misdemeanor traffic court appearance and subsequent driver's 'safety' course assignment over a 10 year period. I'm sure I had nothing to do with our inclusion on that list.....

I realize this thread is 4 years old, but since it was getting bumped and this topic was on my mind, I figured I would chime in. I'm a recent grad lucky enough to have found work as an RN. I trained in school on computerized med systems and I'm currently working in a facility that does the scanning the patients and med thing. I've often complained that the extra minute or 2 that the computer adds to my med passes on each patient and dealing with the hiccups of technology seeming to spaz out at the worst possible moment was too much of a hassle. I always thought things would be so much quicker with a paper MAR. After reading about the unfortunate errors some posters have had, I'm actually grateful to work with a system with some failsafes in place to keep me from making mistakes. I can't imagine the extra stress of worrying about being fired for an accident while you're still trying to learn the ropes of a new profession. Thanks for helping me find a little perspective on one of my daily gripes.

/rant I realize you have been poked at by multiple people in this thread, but I just want to drive home the point so you don't continue running around spouting this anymore. There is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to be paid well for the work you do. If you have more experience or are better at what you do then the other people you work with, you should be paid the same or better than they are. If YOU want to go be the selfless angel who works for free then so be it, that's your choice. Don't tell the rest of us who have 20/40/60k worth of debt from going through school that we should be happy with low wages. /end rant. For the rest of you reading, my apologies. I've come across way too many self righteous people telling me compensation doesn't matter to them in the nursing field, "the job is the reward", false modesty and the "I'm better than you because I don't care about money" attitude really irks me.

Certainly doable, I took pretty much the exact same position as my first nursing job. I've only been doing it 3 months, and kind of got defaulted the charge position since there is only 1 RN per shift on the unit. My unit is smaller, 10 beds and I get just 1 CNA to help. The unit has only had 5 people at a time due to the economy and fewer patients having elective surgery. If I get up to 10 I imagine management will assign a LPN to help out. You have to keep in mind this is a Rehab unit, the workload isn't too bad. The patients have to be pretty stable and able to complete x number of hours of PT/OT a day (3 hours on my unit) or they can't come there. Pain meds, potty breaks, walking with patients, occasional feeds pretty much rounds out the day. You'll have to work with therapy so both of you can accomplish your goals for the day with the patients, but really, its not a bad gig. With your previous experience, I don't think you'll have any problems. To be honest, I'd love to trade places with you! I need some excitement and challenging work. That being said, with the current economic climate, I am grateful to have any job at the moment:D

I don't know how to answer this without seeming like a jerk, so I'll just go for it. You don't owe anyone anything. I know it may seem like a cynical outlook, but you'll only be unhappy and resentful in the long run if you hold yourself back from your full potential out of a misplaced sense of guilt. Not everyone has the drive, desire, or intellectual capacity to be a nurse. Out of that pool of people who can become nurses, there is an even smaller group that have the desire or ability to become advanced practice nurses. So, if you are one of those with the desire/ability/time to advance your education, you owe it to yourself and your patients to do so. There are new grads coming up behind you to take care of the bedside nursing

You are correct in the hourly cost at Aultman, its a tad over $400 an hour. You do all nursing classes and clinicals at that hospital and all academic course work at Walsh University. I can understand your trepidation in going too much further in debt...it racks up quick! 3 loans totaling $20k works out to be about $300 a month payments. The upside to going back to school is that your student loans can be placed back into deferment since you are a student again. That being said, I don't know off hand if there is a cap to how much you can borrow based on what level of degree you are pursuing? That may affect your decision as well. As for hiring, no hospital in Stark County or any of the surrounding counties that I have contacted, are hiring new grads right now. I've been beating on doors for 2 months and have recently decided to take a look at LTC facilities in the hopes of getting some experience. Everyone seems to be looking for experienced people right now. There is a huge glut of nursing graduates in this area. I know of at least 6 schools pumping out nurses in the Canton/Akron area, with a few more up in Cleveland. So as far as having an 'in' with Aultman, as one of their students you do have a better chance than if you were one of Kent's new grads applying. However, they have been on a hiring freeze for 6 months now. We had a graduating class of 50, and the hospital had 24 part time or casual positions available for our class. Hence my retreat back into the realm of academia for my BSN.....something to do so I'm not hanging around the house all day wondering why no HR is calling. One bit of advice I would give to you, that I wish I would have followed when it was given to me, is to get a job as an STNA in a hospital while your in school. This gives you some experience in the nursing field to put down on your resume, and gives you an 'in' on RN positions at that hospital since hospitals prefer to promote from within before opening jobs up to the public.

Hiya, Hopeful! I don't know how long the waitlist is, but in 2006 when I was looking for a school, the wait list was 2 years. This was when the economy was still pretty decent. In a down economy, a lot of people go back to school to ride out the downturn and be ready for when hiring picks up again. So, I'm willing to bet the wait list is still 2 years or longer. I guess how long a wait is too long is up to you and how you view things. Every year without your license is a loss of 40-50k earning potential. So, 2 years of pre req's and 2 years of Nursing program is too long in my book. With that view, I entered Aultman's College of Nursing and Heath Sciences ADN program (no waitlist) and got to work on my degree. Started in Aug. 2007 and completed May 2009. The downside is this program is more expensive, I have 20k in student loans now, however, I weigh that vs. the 80-100k of missed income from waiting on the wait list for 2 years at Stark. I think I'll come out ahead The crap economy has thrown a wrench in my plan though because I got out of school and no one is hiring new Grads! So, back to school I am going while searching for a part time job. I'll be entering Kent States online RN-BSN program and should have the bachelors done in 12 months, about the time jobs will be plentyful again (I hope!). If you have any questions feel free to hit me up. Goodluck in your school search.

The amount of negative and hostile commentary coming from some folks on this board is astounding....and disheartening. It seems a lot of you naysayers are just bitter that you weren't focused or committed enough to attempt such a bold plan. A lot of people made assumptions, false ones I might add, that really gives everyone who reads your posts an insight into how you see the world and I must say, the view wasn't pretty. There were a few people who don't understand how investing works either and yet they chose to voice their opinions anyways. Here's a pro tip for anyone who hasn't figured this out in life yet: '"tis better to be quiet and thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt.";) As to Alwayslearnings plan, the ideas you have are solid and should work if you have the fortitude to see it through. Some of your endgame numbers may need to be adjusted, and/or your time frame pushed out a couple years, and sliding into a part time role at work in your thirties. I didn't get serious about setting goals until I was 25, but I set up a plan and have been able to absorb the bumps in life and still be on track to meet my goals in the allotted time frames. Don't listen to the negativity, you will always come across people who like to tell others what they are or are not capable of. Some people like to try and keep others 'down' just so they don't feel so bad about their own shortcomings in life. In closing, I'd just like to say how hard would it have been for people to wish him goodluck and encourage him to remain motivated? If after 5 years, he only has $100,000 saved at the age of 26 and has to adjust his time frame, who is it hurting? He will still be far ahead of the vast majority of us at that age.

I must admit when I first saw the title of this thread, I thought ppffffftttt....how is it my job to massage someone? I shall qualify that thought with the fact that I'm still a nursing student, so I'm inexperienced in the nursing realm. Also, I'm a guy so the idea of close personal contact with a stranger seems foreign to me. However, I must say that everyones stories here have given me much to think on, as what you have said makes a lot of sense. Five minutes of reading may have just changed how I provide care for the next 30 years :)

lol, I never meant to imply that anyone was affiliated with a whorehouse by the use of the word madam. I was only thinking of it as a polite title like miss, mrs., ma'am. I didn't think of any possible negative connotations associated with it since I did not intend to use the word as a slander. I wonder if that is more of a cultural difference between the U.S. and Australia? The only legal brothels in the states that I know of are in Nevada, far away from me....one of those out of sight out of mind things.

SharonH, You're right, this stuff does get to be tiresome and I'm sure we both have better things to do. However, allow me to address a couple of your concerns. Please forgive me for paraphrasing and listing your prior comments in an easier to respond to manner. 1) First, you don't get to blame me for your rudeness. I didn't make you type anything, so don't use me as an excuse for your actions. Own them, take responsibility for them, defend them if you must....but please don't try to pass the buck. 2) The next item on your list, my condescension. Your right. I don't agree with you, or people that think as you do. If you don't want to listen to people that have opposing views, then don't post your views and I'll be more than happy to keep my mouth shut. Its a two way street there ma'am. Just because your 'religious' doesn't make you more correct than I. The difference between your condescension and mine is that I did not target YOU specifically, I merely stated my views in opposition to religion in general. The other difference is that I was willing to personally call you on your rudeness, whereas you wanted to try and be cute about it. If I said something to bug you, then you should have been an adult about it and pointed out what I said to offend you. Whether or not I thought you were right or wrong, I most likely would have issued an apology for offending you personally since I don't know you and have no desire to disrespect any one person. If you've read this thread in its entirety, then you would see where someone has chosen to speak with me about my views and I have apologized for whatever specific thing I said to offend them. Some people have pointed out when I was making sweeping generalizations, and I admitted my mistake. You however, don't. You blame me for your actions, very classy;). 3) Finally, if you so desire, its well within your rights to bow out of any conversation that no longer interests you. Truth be told I would have probably done it by now myself, but I couldn't let the tirades of the past week go unchallenged and more importantly .....I was bored. For what its worth, I posted that personal information about myself so you would have some idea of who you were talking to, rather than allowing you to labor under the false assumption that I was some unintelligent, uneducated, ignorant scrub, undeserving of common decency and respect:monkeydance:. Good day to you madam.

Put me down for the ICU==>CRNA route. Hopefully I can stay motivated to do the extra schooling beyond my RN licensure.

Heya SharonH, Don't make the mistake of thinking youth = lack of knowledge/intellect/experience/wisdom. I've spent time in Europe, Caribbean Islands, Canada, South America, and the Middle East, experiencing cultures that most people my age and even older have no idea about. I have a chest full of medals and ribbons as testament to my contribution to the world. I am well versed in mechanical engineering and jet propulsion with a fair decent understanding of electrical engineering to boot. I was in the honors program in high school. I have over 80 credit hours under my belt and I'm carrying a 3.78 GPA through nursing school with a 28 ACT and an IQ in the mid 130's. I'm well read and able to easily carry a conversation on most topics. I excel at pretty much everything I try. My confidence in myself and my viewpoints is well deserved and hard earned. Even though I'm stuffed to the gills with hubris, I'm still able to admit when someone with an opposing view makes a good point. I don't think your advanced years gives you free reign to condescend to me. My views are just as valid as anyones (more so imo since their mine ). Furthermore, I believe your not being honest with yourself or the rest of us here if your implying that you don't get irritated when discussing a topic with someone who just doesn't see your viewpoint. I know when I get irritated, I tend to think poorly of the person providing the irritation. So yeah, I think people who disagree with me aren't very smart. The beauty of my system is the opposing party is free to think I'm an idiot as well, (your not going to hurt my feelings). Thats your prerogative. If you have a valid point to make or want to debate a topic, then please make a post of substance and I'll be happy to talk with you. I enjoy the verbal sparring. However, if you do have something to say to/about me, I'd appreciate it if you addressed me rather than make another catty condescending comment. :smiley_abHave a good day.

Stevie, I gotta give ya credit for making a good point. I did make a bit of an ginormous generalization by painting all people of faith with the same brush, my bad.:) I can freely say that I have met some religious people who are able to carry on a lively intellectual debate about weighty topics, some of those people were even on this board;) I appreciate people I can carry a conversation with who are able to make a reasonable argument for what they believe. As I've alluded to previously I'm a man with more questions than answers. I know not *all* religious people are fanatical. I know not *all* are ignorant sheep. I guess when I think of religious people I think of the ultra-conservative bible thumpers who try to cram their beliefs down your throat, then get all huffy and irate when you start poking holes in their beliefs. Those holier than thou folks who want to share the bible's word with me every time they think I'm doing something wrong. But you're right, that is my stereotype and my problem. This is what I don't understand. "I also respect the right of Jehovah's Witnesses to refuse blood products. I don't characterize them as unintelligent - I simply don't agree with their interpretation." You and a few other people have said something along these lines. How can you believe someone is wrong, has a fundamental flaw in their thinking, and still think they have a brain in their head? It seems like your trying to be nice and spare someone's feelings rather than be honest. How can you hold a belief you know to be true (regardless if it is or not, you believe it is) and not judge the person who is opposite your belief an idiot? I think its just human nature to make those sort of judgments. As an aside, since you mentioned C.S. Lewis.... I think I started reading some of his work when I was in my early teens. I was all happy to have found a new (to me) series author to read. I don't recall exactly where I was in the first book when I started to get that deja vu feeling. All this seems kind of familiar...where have I heard this stuff before.... Son of a....I'm reading a religious parable! The sneaky bastard turned one of my favorite pastimes into a sunday school lesson. I was a tad p.o.'ed over that. I really wish he would have stated what the book was in the jacket synopsis, at least then I would have had a choice of whether or not I wanted to invest my time in a many volumed sermon. I did enjoy Tolkien though:lol2:

lol, I'm about as open minded as they come:trout: I'm willing to believe that anything is possible...even God and creation by a benevolent force that cares...or maybe aliens as the progenitors of our species..or alternate dimensions where the rules of physics and science are different than our own...my point is until I see irrefutable evidence of something or at the very least enough evidence to reasonably support a theory I will not be one of those people who go around proclaiming this is the way things are. I'll leave that for the religious, however, I will be there on my soapbox next to the religious folks offering alternatives to their theories. I've tried to give an accurate account of how I see the world that my personal beliefs are fluid and will change based on what I experience in this world, or facts that I find, or maybe just maybe from exchanging ideas with others. I haven't found any one idea that is able to explain everything yet. This, to me, would seem to be the very definition of 'open-mindedness'. I'll be the first person to admit there is a lot of things out there that we haven't explained with science. I still intend to continue looking for the truth of things rather than rolling over, throwing up my hands and having faith. The scientific approach, the thing that medicine and nursing is supposed to be based upon, has done more to advance mankind than faith ever has, so I prefer to stick with that in my personal search for the truth. Faith is giving up and accepting what someone else tells you....just seems a bit lazy to me.

Wow, this is lovely, a week later and this tired old debate meanders on down the path of foolishness. Oh well, since I have a couple minutes to spare, I must thank the people who have kept it going for the past week since its provided me with an insight into the 'mindset' of the religious...particularly the JW guys. Unfortunately, the information provided here doesn't paint the group in a good light and really makes it seem like a cult more than anything else. By the way, just so you know exactly how to sling the mud at me, I'm of the camp that believes that there probably is some sort of Creator but that it doesn't really care all that much about what goes on this mortal plane. Be a good person, don't harm others, I think those are enough rules to be worried about following. Furthermore, I believe that if you take off the blinders for a second and critically think about religion in general and how its been used throughout time, its pretty easy to see that religion is a tool used to control the masses. Basically, more or less, organized religion started as a cult and some of the more popular cults attracted more followers (there is always some weak willed person willing to follow you if you look hard enough), and just like a herd of animals will multiply so that 2 turns into hundreds so do the flock of the faithful as parents indoctrinate their children into a faith. I mean when your 5 years old your parents are flawless, they are your world...certainly they wouldn't lead you astray, so you become one of the faithful too and the flock multiplies. I wonder how all these religions would be doing if we presented our children with the plethora of religions in the world and allowed them to pick what they wanted when they were able to think for themselves, perhaps in their 20's, minus the childhood indoctrination of course. We won't do this though because religion would probably die out within 3 or 4 generations...it would certainly be an interesting experiment though:lol2: I would like to add that I do believe religion has some good ideas in it, matter of fact if we were all to sit down and talk about ideas, morals, right and wrong and all that stuff, most of you would probably think I'm a good guy. You might even be tempted to classify me as a 'religious or spiritual' person, which I'm obviously not. I think the problems we see everyday all stem from the people who are "right" or the "true believers" or whatever the faithful like to call themselves. The people who have their minds made up about what the truth is become close-minded and bigoted. These people once convinced of their own righteousness then attempt to force their beliefs on others. You see this with various faiths and results in much misery in the world. Wars were fought a thousand years ago over it, and will probably continue for the foreseeable future. Just so the JW guys don't feel too singled out, I also think its laughable when I see people playing with snakes or rolling around on the floor or those people who like to start babbling nonsense because the spirit has a'hold of them;). I'm pretty sure those are a result of some random guys interpretation of the bible. While we are talking about the wonderfulness that is cults, or religion if you prefer, how about all that financial, sexual, and political misconduct perpetrated by the religious leaders many folks follow. Those religions that force people to get married, or where the way to salvation is through sleeping with the religious leader are pretty nice too. I won't even bother with the Catholic faith since their shameful misconduct is so well known already, though its gotta sting knowing your tithe to the church is being used to pay off all the victims. I'm sure I'm missing reviewing some groups here, but I've never had a Jewish person or Buddhist or Islamic, or Hindu guy come 'witnessing' to my door attempting to push their beliefs on me. I also never see them posting on the internet about how they are the only right ones in the world. Fanatics, or the guys who 'know the only truth' are dangerous animals regardless of what religion they claim. I think open mindedness is probably the way to go with the religion thing. Well, there's my 2cents....

It has been interesting exchanging ideas with you txpixiedust;) and to be absolutely honest with you I don't want to change people's ideas about religion. I've done that before and felt really bad about the results...if you strip someone of their beliefs and they aren't tough enough to go it alone in the world, the results can be unpleasant. I do commend you on your ability to remain civil since when I re-read my posts I can see where I was trying to dig at ya a bit. About half the reason I write is because I enjoy the debate itself and if everyone who reads becomes a little bit more open minded as a result of seeing a different viewpoint then that's just a bonus :) I don't think of my communication style as harsh, but rather plain spoken, perhaps blunt and to the point. Of course, some may consider that harsh, but I've found over the years that tiptoeing around a subject and choosing your words based on the sensibilities of the audience tends to water down the message I was trying to get across. I generally don't put forth my ideas on religion or my own belief system because I feel its a private personal matter for each person to decide on their own. However, when I see a proponent of organized religion professing there beliefs in a public arena, I feel compelled to speak out since it sort of feels like they are pushing their beliefs on others. I was going to write more here, but I realize that I was going to just bring up more points to debate purely for the sake of continued debate, which is counterproductive. I think I will end by saying that you are welcome to your opinion and while I may disagree with it, it is yours and I can respect your desire to defend your beliefs