Which job should I choose while in nursing school? CNA in hospital vs. nursing home?

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Specializes in student.

So I've currently been working as a PSW (American equivalent to CNA in Canada) in Long term care and to be honest, I HATE it. I'm not learning anything! I don't do vitals or anything remotely nursing just help with ADLs....thats it. I know this is part of the job, but I feel like I could be using my knowledge and skills more as a BScN student entering my final year in September. I tried to talk about this with my manager and all she replied with is "so you're not happy with your job". like im not going to tell her I hate my job so I remained silent. The residents are abusive and the workload is too heavy. I'm working with a bunch of middle aged women and I just don't feel like I belong.

I got a job offer in the resource team at a hospital which I would be super happy to accept, but here's the catch it's "unscheduled" which I think means my hours are not guaranteed. anyone know what an "unscheduled" psw/cna is? the position is also temporarily and is suppose to end in September (can be shortened or lengthened based on the hospital's needs).

I want to choose the hospital position based on the learning opportunity and possibly doing something I enjoy. but at the same time, I want a stable job where I'll get hours and really dont want to be in the position of looking for a new job when the contract ends. WHAT SHOULD I DO?

pros/cons of hospital job

-learning, doing more skills

-"unscheduled" worker

-contract ends in couple months

pros/cons of long term care job

-hate the work

-not learning, literally JUST ADLs

-stable, get hours

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Specializes in Critical Care; Cardiac; Professional Development.

You aren't going to "learn" much as a CNA either, just have to do vitals on top of ADLs.

Unscheduled sounds like a PRN job, or what we call "per diem" here in the States. Yes, that means you don't have guaranteed hours and if they have to send someone home, you will be first in line. However, once you have one of these jobs, its not hard to get another one usually. Making the jump from LTC to acute care (hospital) is the hard part.

Were I you, I would take the hospital position.

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