Which ICU is BEST for Nurse Anesthesia???

[SIGMACHIGUY]

So now that I've passed the NCLEX and am an official RN (), I am looking to apply to ICU units starting this week. I've heard cardio, thoracic, and trauma units are great ICU units to enroll into to satisfy the ICU requirement for nurse anesthesia but am not entirely sure. So I just had 2 questions:

1. Which ICU unit is best and most liked by admission committees when you apply to nurse anesthesia programs?

2. After looking at different ICU units in hospitals that I am applying to, I think I would love cardio-thoracic and trauma ICU's the most. Out of these 2, is there a better one to gain experience in?

Thanks a million in advance for all your thoughts and advice everyone!!

[shandsburnRN-CRNA]

I just started working in a Burn ICU, and I was wondering if it was going to be good experience for entering into an anesthesia program. Any advice of what I should keep an eye out for and pay close attention to? Of course, I will learn as much as I can anyway, but is there anything particular to CRNA school that I should pay the most attention to?

Thanks

Hi,

Yes you will definately get the experience you need in the Burn ICU. My suggestion other than taking the sickest patients with the swans, vasoactive drips, CVVH, vent, trach, multiple lines, etc. is gain excellent organizational skills. Disorganization in anesthesia will kill you quicker than anything else. Another important asset you can pick-up while in the unit is to practice your critical thinking, when you get orders for meds and other things, dont just fill the order b/c its there, know WHY you are doing it, if you dont know, look it up. Not only will you gain better understanding of the BIG picture, it will be good practice for anesthesia school........you'll do alot of it.

Hope this helps out.

Matt

[My_brain_hurts]

I work in a combined cardiac/medical ICU at a level 1 trauma center. We get a fair amount of pt's with vasoactive drips, and currently I think about 12 of our 18 beds vented (ah, it's that time of the year again!). We also get overflow from other ICUs. If they don't have room, the pts come to us. We get ventriculostomies every so often, and on occasion we get surgical/trauma pts.

In my limited experience as nurse, I would say that in general a surgical ICU would give you really good experience, probably better than most MICUs. That's my 1 cent. . . not 2 cents mind you, only 1.

[ncemt]

This comes directly from the Duke SON Anesthesia FAQ web page (http://nursing.duke.edu/modules/son_academic/index.php?id=104):

1. Experience areas preferred (with greatest preference first) include:

[ncemt]

This comes directly from the Duke SON Anesthesia FAQ web page (http://nursing.duke.edu/modules/son_academic/index.php?id=104):

1. Experience areas preferred (with greatest preference first) include:

For some reason that didn't copy properly, so here it is again (or you can just use the link):

1. Experience areas preferred (with greatest preference first) include:

a. Surgical Intensive Care

b. Medical Intensive Care

c. Cardiac Intensive Care

d. Neuro Intensive Care

e. Pediatric or Neonatal Intensive Care

[cathys01]

Of course, that list changes depending on which school you are looking at. Other schools have the same list, but with preferences for CVICU...

[joeyzstj, LPN]

I have 4 friends who are on admissions boards, and all of them prefer CVICU as the first choice. I think the Duke this covers any type of surgical ICU which a CVICU would be. Cardiac ICU to me is like a CCU telemetry unit. CVICU is fast paced, very intense and you will often see and do more there then in any other unit. This isnt just my opinion, its the opinion of many schools. Good luck.

[sarahneeyah]

Prior to anesthesia school I worked in a Burn ICU. What I liked about this patient population was that though it is "trauma" ICU many of these patients (the big devastating burns) ended up with multi-organ system failure to include cardiovascular. So I got fairly good cardiac experience too, while obviously not to the extent of the CVICU, but more than the average trauma or medical ICU (just my opinion). As Happy mentioned, managing fluid shifts, you haven't seen MAJOR fluid shifts until you've treated a burn patient. But the point is you learn what shifts are treated with crystalloids vs. colloids vs. pressors vs. any combination of the three.

No matter which ICU you end up in, getting into a Level I center is your best bet, as you will see the sickest of the sick and become familiar with the high acuity patient population.

Good Luck and congrats on finishing RN school!!

This is the post I've been looking for. Is Burn ICU experience enough for CRNA school? I will be interviewing at a Level I trauma hospital for the Burn ICU unit, and I want to make sure I do my homework if the job is offered to me.

[SRNA84]

Hey! I know this is a few months late, but maybe better late than never. I just went through the whole grad school application thing for anesthesia programs last year. When I graduated with my BSN, I researched the anesthesia programs I would one day want to apply to and I noticed that they all gave preference to adult surgical ICU. I see a lot of people saying CVICU as the number one, and while there may be a lot of autonomy there, and you get a lot of experience with titrating vasoactive medications, there's autonomy in every ICU. I opted to work for a multidisciplinary ICU rather than a specialized one, in that mine was a 3-floor, 48-bed ICU that focused on surgical, trauma, medical, pulmonary, cardiac, and neuro interventions. My average patient varied from day to day... if you want real experience titrating medications, other than just inotropic and vasoactive ones for the heart, and want a full understanding of how all systems relate to each other, invasive devices and hemodynamic monitoring, etc., then I would highly recommend an ICU like the one I got my experience in.

With my relatively short employment there (about 1 year), I was able to secure a position in all 5 of the top 10 anesthesia programs I applied to, and each commented on my experience and being able to take care of virtually any kind of patient as a major plus. It makes you very marketable instead of cornering yourself into one specialty. That's what worked for me; but what works for one person may not work for others. Hope this helps!