suggestions for urgent care nurse?

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Specializes in education, school nursing, med-surg, urgent care.

Hey all,

I'm leaving med-surg nursing (hospital) to go to an urgent care center. Any suggestions or tips to help me transition? Any nursing topics or skills I should brush up on before starting? Thanks in advance...

Urgent care will cover a little bit of everything so be prepared to see and do it all. Some urgent care centers have one LPN/RN/MA and one rad tech during the week, but no rad tech on the weekends so be prepared to know how to obtain basic x-rays too. Multi-tasking and organization are key!

Specializes in Infusion.

Urgent care is very task oriented and you'll be trained on just about everything because there is really a little bit of everything. You will want to be able to talk about being a multi-tasker and good communicator because the physicians are right there working with you. There is way too much to brush up on because you'll be running lab tests for UTIs, doing strep swabs and running rapid strep tests. You may be placing ortho glass splints for fractures (our clinic is part of a larger practice so there is always a radiology tech working). We see people with pneumonia, bronchitis, asthma, CHF and COPD complications, abscesses, STDs, rashes, migraines, and psych issues. You will see all ages from babies to 100 year olds. You will likely be required to do blood draws and start IVs thought IV starts are a rarity. There is lots of variety and problem solving. Have at it : )

Specializes in education, school nursing, med-surg, urgent care.

thanks for the advice.. new job starts this week! woohoo!

I was an emergency dept. tech for two years before getting my LPN license. I now work in urgent care and I love it! It's just like a mini ER and I use all of the skills I learned as a tech, except now I can give meds. We get a fair amount of chest pains as most people are either in denial or just don't want to go to the ER. There really is a great variety to do.

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