Should I do it?

I dont know that I would leap into agency for your first floor job. The first thing you learn on a floor is how to organize for your day. It is very fast paced. If your agency, it is unforunate but you tend to get dumped on more. If your staff more co-workers are willing to help you in this transition.

I agree, a new nurse getting thrown into med/surg through agency could be a bad siutaiton. If you are wanting to get hospital experience or the med/surg exprerience see if you can find a part-time position and just hire into the facility. With agency you may not be there long enough to get the solid experience you need and every med/surg floor is different. So if you dont get a solid orientation you may be so lost working agency and flipping from one facility to another so quickly. Be careful, and remember if you arent comfortable doing a task,, DONT without getting help first.

I know I wouldn't be comfortable with that. I would want to work for a specific place for atleast a year before cosidering agency for med/surg. There is so much to learn! I am working med/surg a little over a year and still feel pretty green. I would not be ready for agency yet, but that is me. It takes me a looooooooong time to feel comfortable with anything. Good luck with whatever you decide. BTW, I love your name!!

Thank guys for your advice. You were so right. I was offered an 11-7 position the other day. I thought...well since it's 11-7 it shouldn't be too busy, I can take my time, get comfortable....so I accepted. It turns out that I was sent to a very advanced oncology floor...OH MY GOD. Everybody as on IV med (which I knew nothing about, not even hanging), everybody was in pain, I even had to chase down a guy who said he was going to the emergency room because he was in pain. I told the charge nurse I didn't have ANY IV experience, I didn't even know how to make the IV machine stop beaping. She agreed to do all of my IV stuff for me, I prayed that if I got through the night I wouldn't do it again. At the end of the night, the charge nurse said that I did a good job considering, I guess she could see in my face I felt defeated. I won't do that again.

you can refuse the assignment because you need med-surg training for at least a year before going into a specialty like that.

I too am a new grad LPN as of aug 05. I work at a hospital and I love it but I can tell you that you can not compare a nursing home and a hospital. i had to do lots of time in nursing homes for school and it is just a different atmosphere. med/surg floors are normally crazy and you have to be able to keep up. there are orders galore coming in, new admits plus taking care of the patient on top of everything. my orientation lasted 6-8weeks and you shadowed for 8 hours??? agency nurses are expected to function independently. honestly you have no business working agency with no hospital experience. and i would question an agency who would hire you. we don't use agency nurses at the hospital I work at but they do at a couple others in the area and i know from friends at those facilities that the hospital will blacklist agancy nurses that they feel are not able to do the job. think about it this way.. what type of orientation would you have if you hired in at a hospital as a LPN?? and the agency wants you to work after 8 hours???? run girl run.