I've only worked at the family practice for a month (I wrote another post about quitting this job soon), and the people I work with think being a nurse at a hospital is so damn easy. They think working at a doctor's office is really complicated and difficult, and being a nurse at a hospital is a breeze. One is an LPN and has worked at a hospital, and the other girl is an MA and doesn't understand why people think working at a hospital is hard.
Have any of you done both? Hospital and Office nursing?
Actually her LTC patients might not have been less acutely ill then the hospital pts. Not everyone is an elderly DNR. I agree with you that hospital nursing is not "easy" on the other hand LTC/SNF are not what they used to be. More LTCs are actually SNF & rehabs, corporate is taking vent pts with no RTs on staff or on call for backup, trachs galore, neuro injuries, a few are even doing blood transfusions. I think your friend is excited by the fact that she will be in a hospital where there are doctors that are actually in the building, unit secretaries, rapid reponse teams, code teams, iv teams, RTs, a pharmacy that is in the same building, security etc. What LTC/SNF has now is higher acuity pts then ever seen before with absolutely 0 money spent on anything. Forget about the absurd nurse to pt ratios.
I work midnights. I used to have 35 residents on my floor who were all LTC. One LPN and 2 CNAs per floor. One RN in the building. They put on an addition and I now have 43 residents/patients. Some are LTC, the rest is rehab because that's where the money is. They are much more acute and demanding with a higher turn over. I make no extra $ (other than my usual annual raise) and the staff is exactly the same.
I've worked both and now work strictly outpatient. For those who think nurses in outpatient sit on their butts all day, think again! At least with the clinics I have worked at, some of which can be close to a mini ER at times. However, for the most part an MD office can be just as BUSY (meaning actual running around time) as a hospital but to me it's less STRESSFUL.
With the exception of my urgent care clinics, there's less chance of a MAJOR screwup plus you always have a doctor on hand should something go wrong. You won't be flying solo trying to track down docs in the middle of the night for something nor will you have to worry about tracking them down to check orders/etc, since they are right there to just ask. There's no weekends or holidays (usually). Admissions nowadays are 'call an ambulance' or 911. Seems most clinics I work no longer even have a crash cart.
However, if you have pediatrics in a clinic, you have tons of shots and screaming kids and screaming parents.. If you have adults you'll find yourselves doing 20 fingersticks a day and some clinics even run IV fluids and other fun stuff. And there's all those phone calls/referrals/prescriptions/nebulizers/etc. So it's not all roses. And when the doc is running late you have to deal with all sorts of irate people, finding rooms, etc.
To me the WORK can be a tossup ( I once worked SICU where there was lots of downtime until the sh*t hit the fan!) , but the stress is not. You could not pay me enough to work in a hospital again even if I run my butt off at the clinic.
Specializes in CCU, SICU, CVSICU, Precepting & Teaching.
i've only worked at the family practice for a month (i wrote another post about quitting this job soon), and the people i work with think being a nurse at a hospital is so damn easy. they think working at a doctor's office is really complicated and difficult, and being a nurse at a hospital is a breeze. one is an lpn and has worked at a hospital, and the other girl is an ma and doesn't understand why people think working at a hospital is hard.
have any of you done both? hospital and office nursing?
just curious on what you think :)
i've never worked in an office, but i've always fantasized about working with patients who were alert, oriented and responsible for toileting themselves. i'm sure there must be difficulties that i'm unaware of, but that seems like pretty easy work to me.
i'm guessing that the grass always looks greener -- or the other job must be easier. one thing i'm wondering, though, is do mas work in hospitals? if they do, are they then cnas or clin techs?
DizzyLizzyNurse
1,024 Posts
I work midnights. I used to have 35 residents on my floor who were all LTC. One LPN and 2 CNAs per floor. One RN in the building. They put on an addition and I now have 43 residents/patients. Some are LTC, the rest is rehab because that's where the money is. They are much more acute and demanding with a higher turn over. I make no extra $ (other than my usual annual raise) and the staff is exactly the same.