Why did you choose Med-Surg?

westieluv · May 18, 2011

I don't know if I chose Med/Surg as much as it chose me. When I graduated from nursing school 21 years ago, Med/Surg jobs were plentiful and specialized nursing jobs were not, plus, they required experience in that area. I started working Med/Surg because that's where the job was and found out that I really liked it. There was no other area, such as ED, critical care, peds, or labor and delivery, that I really cared to get into, so I just stuck with Med/Surg. I think it's a good field to be in to keep your skills sharp, since you see so many different disease processes and surgical cases, especially if you float like I did. I never noticed a big difference between medical and surgical floors, because in every facility where I ever worked, they would put a at least a few medical patients on the surgical floors and vice versa as census and bed space dictated. IOW, every floor had at least some medical patients and some surgical patients. I guess it would be different in a really large hospital, but I always worked in small to mid-sized hospitals.

tokmom, BSN, RN · May 21, 2011

Ditto to what the other poster said. Jobs were plentiful, you needed Med-Surg experience to do anything else. I do love mother/baby and labor and delivery has always called my name. However, I never wanted to work FT and take away from my own kids, to be a FT delivery nurse. I think to be good at that field, it's something you can't just work a couple days a week at unless you have years behind you. I also like working with men. Some of those new moms think they have given birth to the Christ Child and won't eve fluff their own blasted pillow. Men on the other hand might grumble and cuss, but at least they say it and be done with it.

So, long story short, I joined a float pool and for years floated and worked it all, (minus ICU).

Med surg keeps my skills sharp and I like the variation. It could be an easy hip or a septic and very sick patient. The best of both worlds.

westieluv · May 21, 2011

Ditto to what the other poster said. Jobs were plentiful, you needed Med-Surg experience to do anything else. I do love mother/baby and labor and delivery has always called my name. However, I never wanted to work FT and take away from my own kids, to be a FT delivery nurse. I think to be good at that field, it's something you can't just work a couple days a week at unless you have years behind you. I also like working with men. Some of those new moms think they have given birth to the Christ Child and won't eve fluff their own blasted pillow. Men on the other hand might grumble and cuss, but at least they say it and be done with it.
So, long story short, I joined a float pool and for years floated and worked it all, (minus ICU).
Med surg keeps my skills sharp and I like the variation. It could be an easy hip or a septic and very sick patient. The best of both worlds.

I love and agree with this entire post! I also never wanted to take away from my own kids to take care of others, so I always worked as a contingent float in the Med/Surg float pool on the off shifts when my dh was home with our two kids. And ITA that working a couple of days a week in L&D doesn't seem sufficient to be really up on it, or at least it wouldn't be for me. Also, one of my main mantras in nursing has always been that the worst patients by far are younger women in pain. IDK why, but that has been my experience. They can just become such whiners, divas, attention seekers, etc. Not ALL of them by any means, not even the majority of them, but way too many from what I've experienced. Whenever we would have the regular drug seekers come into one of our units--"I'm in sooooo much pain, boo hoo, boo hoo...I want 75 of Demerol and 25 of Phenargan and put it right here", indicating a spot on her hip--nine times out of ten they would be women under fifty. At least in Med/Surg you get a vast variety of patients of both sexes to keep things fresh and interesting.