What are my chances? Should I wait another year or gain exp w bigger icu units?

[babiiphatt]

Hello everyone! First I would like to thank everyone for the time and effort in reading and giving advice to my post. I can't tell you how appreciative I am of all nurses forum as I have learned so much. That being said, my current stats are as follow:

I currently live in Texas.

I have 1.5 year experience in small CCU unit. I just recently got another prn job in an 16 bed ICU/CCU in another small community hospital. I currently have my BLS, ACLS, PALS, and CCRN. I am taking the scheduled GRE in august. That being said, I am worried that my hospital experience isn't enough as it is of a smaller hospital. By the time I apply, I will have 2.5 years of ICU/CCU experience.

I am planning on taking chemistry, biology, retaking statistics this fall 2014 and physics I, Chem 2, biochemistry in spring 2015. I will also take organic chemistry 1 summer 2015 in june in hopes to raise my GPA from a 3.2 higher to be more competitive and have a better science background. I will use this year to also shadow more CRNA's since I want to confirm that this field is what I really want to get into, although it has always been a lifelong goal of mine.

I have read alot of posts on allnurses with better hospital experience and higher GPA's. My current GPA of 3.2 and hospital experience seems lacking. Please let me know what else you think I can do to make myself more marketable and competitive. Is there any success stories of people who applied with stats similar to mine and got in? If you did, what schools or states was it in? Especially anyone who has applied to TWU or TCU or any texas schools. I am also applying to florida schools since i have fsmily there thst could help with kiddos. I am almost 30yo single household income family with 3 kids and so this career change is a very significant one considering the sacrifices i have to make (but not regret) to achieve this lifelong goal of mine. I am totally serious in achieving this goal :) and any input will be greatly appreciated. Thankyou!

[lady_stic]

I interviewed with 1 year ICU experience at a level 1 trauma center and will have just under 2 years experience at the start of school. I worked in a trauma ICU and got great experience but at the same time, I believe that you can get great experience at smaller hospitals as well. Just make sure that you're getting experience with invasive monitoring (A-lines, CVPs) and vasoactive drips. Of course experience with swans, intra-aortic balloon pumps, CRRT are all a plus and will make you more competitive. I would just go ahead and apply. You can make your experience in your resume and your personal statement sound a lot better than it really is :). Some schools mostly ask personal questions so you won't really have to prove yourself much clinically. TWU, however is a beast of an interview and you have to know your stuff. CCRN definitely helps but I think experience also helps for an interview like that. Out of my 6 interviews, TWU was the worst. I will start school this month and I sometimes feel that even though I got in, I wish I had more ICU experience. You really never know until you apply.