new nurse/experience

eatmysoxRN, ASN, RN · May 22, 2012

I'm a newer nurse as well (1 yr) and everything I read says minimum 1 year exp. Honestly, I think I want to wait atleast another year or two so I will be extremely comfortable.

MindiRN724 · May 22, 2012

I'm also a new graduate nurse and I kept receiving emails from an agency that places travel nurses. I finally called and they said that they normally require 18 months of experience.

FutureNurse2B · May 23, 2012

I started traveling with a yr and a half experience. I would suggest to have at least 1yr experience if not more. YOu need to be absolutely comfortable on your own as a nurse b/c you will be expected to hit the floor running as a traveler. Some places will only give you 1 day of orientation on the floor. After that you are expected to be independent as the nurse. Of course you can always ask questions but some places aren't as travel friendly as others are. I've heard horror stories of nursing going places where some nurses are mean and refuse to answer your questions. I have never been anywhere like this before but if you were in this situation, you risk your liscense. Good luck. Wait a little longer.

joy679 · Jul 4, 2012

Questions Questions Questions ! I plan to be a travel nurse one day. I figured I would wait until I had 2 years of experience before trying it. Right now I am a LVN taking prerequiste classes for the RN program at my college. The questions I have are about the pay, housing -does the company pay for your housing? do they pay the utilities too? If so which utilities? Does the apartment come furnished and if so to what degree is it furnished? Like do you need to bring your own TV, kitchenware, bath towels, linens, etc etc. Does the apartment come decorated? And if you are taking an assignment in another state do you drive there so you will have your own transportation or do you fly and rent a car? How much stuff do you really need to bring to set up your place. Do you only need to bring yourself and your luggage? If you plan to be a travel nurse is it best to just give up your apartment back home and put everything in storage since you won't be needing most of it for as long as you are traveling? And what about bringing a member or two from my family and my two dogs? Is that allowed also? Pet deposit? One bedroom or two? I was hoping that travel nursing would be a good way to see other parts of the United States or other parts of my home state since it is so big. Also I thought travel nursing might pay better than local nurse jobs. So please if any of you seasoned travel nurses could help me out with some of my questions I would very much appreciate any info.

dorie43rn · Jul 4, 2012

I waited until I had six years as an ICU nurse before I walked into another ICU as a traveler, and I'm glad I did. You HAVE to know your s..t to have only 1or2 day orientation and hit the floor with everybody watching you to make sure you can do your job. My advice is to get a few good years of steady experience at one job, then take off.

For example, my hospital I worked at for six years was a small town small stuff ICU. On only my second travel job, which is now, I was handed a liver transplant pt and am expected to take care of him. Its a huge Level one trauma unit and I was very nervous to start here, but now I'm feeling more confident. If I had only one year in nursing, I would have run!