Thought I knew, then went to peds and NICU

[rebeccaUTA]

Hello! I’m graduating in May with my BSN. I’ve thought for quite a while that I all wanted to do is CC and ED (possibly getting certified as a SANE), but recently I have really, REALLY enjoyed my peds and NICU rotations more than expected. Very much felt like the NICU people were my people and I had the best conversation with a transport NICU nurse yesterday. Her role sounds incredible to me - with the kind of skills, challenge and intensity I thrive off of.

Can y’all please weigh in if you know these specialties fairly well? I have to pick my capstone next semester and I’d like to pick somewhere where I plan to stay. My gpa and practice exam scores are high so that’s good. I’m really open to everyone’s feedback and appreciate any knowledge you can share that might help me pick between adult ICU/CC, ED, Peds ICU or NICU. Also, were you ever torn between specialties at one point and how did you choose?

Thank you!

[mcb9606, BSN]

This sounds like I could have written it myself. I went into school thinking I was going to do adult ICU for sure. And I always said I was NOT going to do peds. My peds rotation was amazing and made me rethink everything. My clinical instructor worked in the NICU, we didn’t get to do rotations there but she walked us through it and told us about it. I sat down 1:1 with her and talked more about it.

I debated between a Peds ICU and NICU for my capstone and went with NICU since I knew less about it. I absolutely loved it and am now working in a Level IV NICU.

The NICU (and most ICUs I would assume) is very routine, not that it’s not crazy busy or unexpected stuff never happens, but in the fact that I know every 3-4 hours I am assessing and feeding a baby. There’s a schedule to the unit as far as when provider rounds are, the days we do head/length, when eye exams are, etc. I love organization and routine so it’s perfect for me. When things get crazy as they always do, I know what needs to be done and when so I don’t get completely lost, can delegate appropriately, and our teamwork is amazing so people jump in to help anyway they can. I think kids and especially babies are way more complex than adults (though don’t have chronic illnesses yet) and caring for a 1-2 pound baby is hard! You also have to like educating and helping families. So much of being a NICU nurse is helping parents understand and care for their babies. Some families are hard to deal with but some families you get really close to.

The ED is going to be completely different, you never know what is coming in next and it can be very busy high stress all the time. I also love that and you get times of that in any unit but I come from an EMS background so I knew I wanted something different. In the ED you will get a lot of skills and exposure to different things.

Do you have an option of a Peds ED? It would be good experience across a variety of ages while you figured out what you wanted to do specifically. As far as figuring it out, just go with your gut and what you want to get out of the experience, it’s a cliche answer but there is no other good way :) Your capstone can definitely give you a leg up when it comes time to apply/interview if you are sticking with that area, but it’s not the end all. Many people I know did a capstone in one area and decided to work in another. And I mean like adult ICU to Mother/Baby different :)

[rebeccaUTA]

This is such great info. Thank you so much! I appreciate your feedback a lot! Good to know that people changed their mind so drastically after capstone and it didn’t matter.