I'm presently doing med-surg in an inner-city hospital. It's tough, but I'm managing so far. I only plan to work a year or two on this floor, then transfer to another unit (perhaps MICU) or maybe to another hospital (this one has a bad reputation).
I've been thinking about what I've seen over these first 4 months in nursing, and I've found that there are some things I like:
Teaching patients
Talking with patients
Caring directly for the patients (wound care, etc)
And some things I don't like:
Trying to get through the med pass on time
Lots of charting, often driven by fear of management or lawsuits
Lack of control
Conflicts with other nurses.
Thinking about this, I've noticed that I seem to like patient interaction and would probably like a position that would involve more of that than I'm presently getting.
Any fields that come to mind? Besides inpatient psych, that is?
Any fields that come to mind? Besides inpatient psych, that is?
Sorry that you're not a fan of inpatient psych because there's definitely tons of patient interaction in there.
So therefore...ICU or maybe a PCU? Both would give you fewer patients (4 or less per shift) and more time to teach and interact...however the trade-off is that their conditions are more serious, so you may not always have that extra time: you may get so tied up caring for one critical patient and then only have minimal time/interaction for the rest.
There's also PACU: once your patient comes up from anesthesia, you can get some interaction. I had a great nurse after my own surgery--after talking to her, she's the reason I decide to enroll in the Kaplan NCLEX review course :)
Joe NightingMale, MSN, RN
1,734 Posts
Thanks!
Hospice is one area I've thought about since I first decided to become a nurse, it was one of the motivations.
Given some thought to home health too.
ICU has been in the plan for a while, more as an improvement over where I am now than a radical change.
I have worked as a CNA in rehab, and it would probably be better than med-surg like ICU it wouldn't be a radical change.
I spent a few hour in our ED, didn't like the chaos. But this is inner-city ED, and is probably a bit different in other settings.
My instructors have suggested academia, which I'm also considering.