Rn's, are you able to do job well without chemistry class?

[northmississippi]

summer is coming up and i thought about taking chemistry, even though its not required in the RN/ADN or the BSN program here. Should i take it anyway? or just save my money? Does chemistry class help you understand medications better or help you take care of patients better? thanks.

edit: really, my schools here dont require it, i checked. its only listed on the pre-nursing course at the community college, but the bsn college nor the college that has the prenursing course dont require it either for adn/rn...so,,im thinking i'll just read a cliffs notes book on my own and let it rest there.

and use my summer to take sociology and nutrition which is required.

good idea?

[nursejoed]

You'd only need it for graduate programs. Any chemistry concepts you need for nursing e.g. acid/base balances, etc. are doable and understandable as taught in the context of nursing courses without having a whole chem class.

[Sonjailana]

I thought it was very useful.

[p_hawk]

I agree with nursejoed. I wasn't required to take a chemistry class to graduate and I don't feel that it hinders my patient care at all. Chemistry isn't Pharmacology. Which I wasn't required to take either... but that's a whole other story, ha ha!

[Juwon]

Here in chicago, the community colleges are requiring that all students who are pursuing a career as a Registered Nurse, ADN, must take basic chemistry and pass with a B or higher, or take a higher level chemistry and pass with a C or higher. This chemistry class had been in effect for the last two years.

[NaKcl, BSN, RN]

You will be fine without chemistry class.

However, both ADN/BSN degree requires chemistry nowadays.

[MomRN0913]

Chemistry was required for me, but I took a 5 week accelerated course and remember nothing from it. You don't need it. save yoruself the headache and money

[p_hawk]

You will be fine without chemistry class.

However, both ADN/BSN degree requires chemistry nowadays.

I recently graduated from an ADN program and chemistry wasn't required. It is, however, for most RN-BSN programs that I know of.

[DarkBluePhoenix]

How on earth did you take Microbiology without chemistry?

[VivaLasViejas, ASN, RN]

Chemistry was required for my nursing program 16 years ago. It definitely helped when I took Nutrition the next semester, but the only thing I've used it for since then was teaching my kids why they couldn't get grease off the frying pan with cold water alone.

[LDRNMOMMY, BSN, RN]

I recently graduated from an ADN program and chemistry wasn't required. It is, however, for most RN-BSN programs that I know of.

I graduated from Indiana Wesleyan's RN-BSN program in Dec of 2009 and at that time it was not required. I have no idea if that is still the case. I never took chemistry and I am able to do my job just fine. It sure wouldn't hurt to take it though.

[tntrn, ASN, RN]

Chemistry was the one class I barely scraped by in. Thank goodness for a good lab partner. I can't think of one use I've had for it in 34 years of nursing. And it was required for my ADN program or I wouldn't have put myself through that.