3rd Semester Apprehension

you're overreacting. the job of a cna is nowhere near what the job of an rn is. work experience as a cna will not be considered when you go looking for work as an rn. you've been in rn school for a year and it is sad that you do not know what an rn does, so let me enlighten you. an rn is a manager of patient care; an rn is continually resolving problems that patients have; an rn supervises the care given by subordinate nursing staff (that includes cnas); when there is time an rn can also perform nursing procedures and treatments but can also delegate them to others. a cna does not manage patient care or do any independent resolution of patient problems without the approval of the rn. the cna is delegated work by an rn and must report back almost all activities to an rn. a cna is not permitted to do any independent thinking. the nursing skills you may be allowed to do are limited according to what the facility will allow.

i hired new grads at several hospitals. the procedure was the same. we never expected new grads to have much experience at having done many nursing procedures. being a cna merely meant that someone understood how 24/7 facilities operated. we were more interested in getting recommendations from one or more of your nursing school instructors because they are the only ones who could tell us if you knew how to think critically and use the nursing process. thinking critically and using the nursing process is not a requirement for any cna position. we needed to know that you knew what to do when a patient had something go wrong or at least how to think your way through to a way to solve it. that is not a requirement for any cna position either. we are more interested that new grads know the principles supporting procedures because they will become skilled at procedures with time and practice but we are not going to invest our time in teaching new grads principles they should have already learned in school.

You're feeling left out because you don't have the same summer experiences to talk about and share with your schoolmates! The clinical experiences on a general surgery floor and on a general medicine floor compared to newborn/post partum/labor and delivery and an off site in the community are also different, but are professional nursing as well. The point of clinicals when in nursing school is to expose and give students a taste of what each nursing area is like and not to develop any kind of extensive experience. If a student has the opportunity to gain some extra experience and be exposed to different situations--great. If not, that's OK too because all employers of new grads are aware that experience is not an ideal part of the learning situation. That is why a lot of employers have new grad orientation programs. I highly doubt that your instructor meant for you to take a semester off of school to work as a CNA.

I hired new grads into RN positions. I'm telling you, in case you didn't get it, that taking a semester off of school to work as a CNA just to get "some more experience" is a bad decision. You will get plenty of experience in whatever job you get hired into. I would have a real problem hiring a new grad who had done something like take a semester off of school just to get some CNA work experience! Your confidence with regard to physical nursing skills and tasks will grow with time and experience. Every single person who went to nursing school had these same feelings of lack of confidence during nursing school. You keep putting one foot in front of the other and moving forward or move to the side with the quitters. RNs are primarily leaders and problem solvers and that is not something you seem to have figured out yet. RNs are hired for their ability to manage the care of patients and the nursing skills are important, but not as cherished as their thinking skills. You need to stay in school.

I am giving you one manager's view. As a manager I can't take the chance of hiring an RN who might break down emotionally and possibly need or ask for time off every time they have a problem feeling "totally comfortable with [their] skills and confidence". That becomes a problem/needy employee. I need a RN who leads, takes the bull by the horns and solves problems, stamps out fires. I can hire handfuls of CNAs to pass ice water, give baths, change linens, help people to the BR and take vital signs.