Wondered if there where any Nurses on here. I know it's a male dominated message board but I still figured I'd ask. Right now I'm looking to do an advanced bachelors in Nursing since I already have my Bachelor's Degree. I was just reading online that it's hard to get a nursing job right now. Maybe that's just California, but I definitely want to stay out here.

Also I've wanted to be a nurse for a long time, I should have originally chose this the first time around but little late to dwell. Anyways I'm a little squirmish about stuff like blood and vomit, etc. What's the best way to get over something like that.

I am not a nurse, but am a son of a nurse.

It depends on what you want to do with your nursing degree. You could go into more administration roles -- women get paid really well in administration roles. You could be a school nurse, where the blood and vomit wouldn't be as regular as in a hospital. You could be a nurse at a prison/correctional facility. There are many opportunities with nursing. I like to advise people to go into nursing if they are questioning a medical profession. You can find a job anywhere and everywhere (pretty much). Pretty good pay. Good benefits. Depends on what you like, not bad hours.

I think there is a fair demand in certain locations for nurses. It's not like there's going to be a shortage of sick people any time soon. My mom is a nurse and she turned down $10k to move to Pennsylvania.

There is a fair demand still in certain areas of the country. For instance with me, it will be difficult to get a job in Ohio because of the sheer volume of nursing colleges that are putting out graduates. That and the high pay scale that Ohio gives are 2 problems with this area and why I'm probably leaving. California is going to be where you run into similar trouble. The pay is comparable to Ohio, the weather is better than anywhere you will find, and there are a decent number of colleges.

The 'whatever' degree to a BSN depends on the school that you want to go to. Some are flat out awful and a joke of epic proportions. You need a place that fits your needs. You have to decide if you want a college that assigns you a preceptor for your clinical or whether or not you want a college that lets you do the majority of that on your own. The structure differs greatly from what I am currently doing in my undergrad BSN program.

That being said, I really like it. It is a good thing to get in to. People that say it is hard to get a job are just saying it is harder than before. Before you could pretty much quit your job on a daily basis and get a new one by the end of the day. Now it just takes a little bit of effort.

I know plenty of people that I have class with that don't like blood. Saying you don't like vomit is like saying you prefer oxygen lol. You'll never grow to like that. But with blood there are certainly ways to avoid it. You may not avoid it in clinical though. Say you wanted to get a job in a doctors office, I can't imagine seeing blood in that environment right now off of the top of my head. Just depends on the situation and setting.

im a student at osu looking to do the accelerated bsn route, but there is the msn which will make you a practitioner where you oversee and can write prescriptions.

It's so weird reading this topic. I was living with a Nurse 12 years ago a places were begging for Nurses. So much that she left a local hospital to go to a Cincy hospital at higher pay. Only to go back to the local hospital at the Cincy pay, once they became part of the Network.

Then again its an over populated field now like my job in IT.

My wifes a nurse. It's good money, especially if you want to work extra...

Curly J;668098 wrote:It's so weird reading this topic. I was living with a Nurse 12 years ago a places were begging for Nurses. So much that she left a local hospital to go to a Cincy hospital at higher pay. Only to go back to the local hospital at the Cincy pay, once they became part of the Network.

Then again its an over populated field now like my job in IT.

That's why I got out of IT, too many people, jobs were starting to pay lower and lower. Plus it was very boring to me.

I'm in school right now working on my BSN. I have about a year to go. I'm 3 years removed from HS so I was definitely fortunate to get into a program right away after my freshman year of college.

The ultimate goal is to go into advanced practice afterwards. Hope to start that only a couple years from now, but we'll see. I also plan to work in different kind of atmosphere. Working in prisons has always fascinated me because my dad has been a correctional guard all his life and always tells me about the health care there. I'm also very interested in oncology and palliative disciplines. I guess I just want to be depressed every day of my life or something.

I'm alright with blood, vomit, sputum, guts, necrotic tissue, etc. The only thing that gets me is the smell of a colostomy bag that should have been changed an entire shift ago and c. diff. So I guess shit is my weakness. Every nurse seems to have something that gets to them. Luckily, mine is more of a smell induced weakness and there's a variety of interventions I can do to not make it as bad. I feel sorry for the people who get weak by just looking at something....they're kind of screwed because there's no way around that one.

Charlie - C Diff is the absolute worst. I worked in an open heart unit for a couple of years during college and I could smell it as soon as I walked into the unit. And c-dff can't be killed with sanitizer so you really gotta make sure you use contact precautions...

With your military experience, you would be a shoe in to get a job within the VA system. Also, I know someone that has been with the VA for 21 yrs with only the RN license(not Bachelors), and makes 85k+. Hard to beat the benefits and compensation of a Federal nursing job.

Thunder70;668219 wrote:Charlie - C Diff is the absolute worst. I worked in an open heart unit for a couple of years during college and I could smell it as soon as I walked into the unit. And c-dff can't be killed with sanitizer so you really gotta make sure you use contact precautions...

Yep, it's one of the worst smells on this world...no doubt. People think necrotic tissue is way worse than C. diff but I just can't agree. It's devastating. I swear the cillia in my respirtatory tract has been singed from prior experiences with c. diff.

se-alum;668238 wrote:With your military experience, you would be a shoe in to get a job within the VA system. Also, I know someone that has been with the VA for 21 yrs with only the RN license(not Bachelors), and makes 85k+. Hard to beat the benefits and compensation of a Federal nursing job.

I'm doing clinicals right now at a VA and no doubt it's one of the better places to work. Great pay and benefits. I know it sounds terrible to say this but many of the patients are there on a long term/ rest of their life basis which creates a more relaxed work environment for the staff. It's much easier to get into a routine when it's like that and the staff isn't killing themselves to meet discharge deadlines. The only downfall is that it will definitely make you kind of lazy as a nurse lol Also I think you need 5 years experience as a RN to work for them.

charliehustle14;668553 wrote:I'm doing clinicals right now at a VA and no doubt it's one of the better places to work. Great pay and benefits. I know it sounds terrible to say this but many of the patients are there on a long term/ rest of their life basis which creates a more relaxed work environment for the staff. It's much easier to get into a routine when it's like that and the staff isn't killing themselves to meet discharge deadlines. The only downfall is that it will definitely make you kind of lazy as a nurse lol Also I think you need 5 years experience as a RN to work for them.

that's cool i would love to work at a VA. Since they always forget about Veterans. But my whole thing is I don't want to spend all that money, which most of it should come from my GI Bill, time and not be able to find a job. I'm reading the allnurses.com message boards and it seems it takes a year for a new grad to find a job. That seems crazy. Plus the wait to just get into some programs I've seen is up to 3 years. Sometimes I wish I could go back 10 years and changed my major like I wanted to instead I listened to my uncle who said IT is the way to go, this was before the .com bust.

Da woman is 12 credits away from her BSN from tOSU. Hit me up if you would like to know more.

Ytowngirlinfla;668844 wrote:that's cool i would love to work at a VA. Since they always forget about Veterans. But my whole thing is I don't want to spend all that money, which most of it should come from my GI Bill, time and not be able to find a job. I'm reading the allnurses.com message boards and it seems it takes a year for a new grad to find a job. That seems crazy. Plus the wait to just get into some programs I've seen is up to 3 years. Sometimes I wish I could go back 10 years and changed my major like I wanted to instead I listened to my uncle who said IT is the way to go, this was before the .com bust.

I think the problem with finding jobs in the nursing field is too many new grad nurses are dead set on working only in the hospital environment. That's the reason they went to school and that's their only focus. However, there's tons of job options for an RN. If you don't limit yourself to wanting to work in a hospital environment, I think you'll be fine. Prisons, schools/universities, mental health/drug rehabilitation institutions, home health agencies, hospice, private physician offices, health departments, and nursing homes all employ RN's, and those are just off the top of my head. Not to mention with the electronic health record's emergence, there's been a sudden demand for nursing informatics specialists. It sounds like you have a background in IT so that definitely could be a route for you to go. Definitely worth looking into if that's your type of thing. Also, perhaps look into the MDS nurse as well They do work with computers, patient records, and care plans to ensure quality care and reimbursement from Medicare/Medicaid. Not to mention, in Ohio anyone with a RN-BSN degree can teach associate RN students. And there's definitely a demand for nurse educators. But I don't know if that's the same in California. Also keep in mind that there's quite a few older nurses out there working right now who are on the verge of retiring within the next 5 years or so.

And just a side note, the way these Veterans get thrown away is pitiful. Very rarely do these patients get any type of family visitation. Sad to know how much these men did for our country and their friends and family can't find a few minutes out of the week to visit them. That's been the hardest thing to come to grips with while doing my clinical work at the VA this quarter.

Ytowngirlinfla;668844 wrote:that's cool i would love to work at a VA. Since they always forget about Veterans. But my whole thing is I don't want to spend all that money, which most of it should come from my GI Bill, time and not be able to find a job. I'm reading the allnurses.com message boards and it seems it takes a year for a new grad to find a job. That seems crazy. Plus the wait to just get into some programs I've seen is up to 3 years. Sometimes I wish I could go back 10 years and changed my major like I wanted to instead I listened to my uncle who said IT is the way to go, this was before the .com bust.

Here is a link to all the VA jobs that came up w/ the keyword RN.

http://jobsearch.usajobs.gov/search.aspx?q=RN&where=&x=0&y=0&brd=3876&vw=b&FedEmp=N&FedPub=Y&pg=1&re=3

I work at a VA, and I've never heard of the 5yrs experience thing, but I know alot of the HR people, so I can definitely find out if that is some sort of stipulation.

I've worked as a PCT (or STNA) for almost 5 years now just north of Dayton. Right now I'm in my second semester (of four) in respiratory therapy. I too can remember how they use to have sign-on bonuses for nursing because they were so desperate. Now though it's like the only shit available is in nursing homes or rehabilitation units, and no one wants to work there. I wonder what the market will be like for me when I'm getting out of school a year from now. I think it shouldn't be half-bad for RT's because unlike nursing not everyone and their sister does it. By the way, for those of you older ones on here with a son in high school, I would strongly advise you advise them on nursing. The programs are all about 90% women (that's the fun part), and hospitals really will go out of their way to hire men, because of the physical advantages.

ytown -- I think the blood and guts thing comes with exposure. The more you handle that shit (literally) the more normal it becomes. I'm with charliehustle, though. Colostomy bags are the WORST.

The best thing about studying healthcare is that there's always more to know, more to learn with plenty of resources available. Unless your name is Dr. Gregory House, then you can spend hours researching and learning. I can sit down to study something and get easily sidetracked researching it and trying to understand more.

se-alum;668932 wrote:Here is a link to all the VA jobs that came up w/ the keyword RN.

http://jobsearch.usajobs.gov/search.aspx?q=RN&where=&x=0&y=0&brd=3876&vw=b&FedEmp=N&FedPub=Y&pg=1&re=3

I work at a VA, and I've never heard of the 5yrs experience thing, but I know alot of the HR people, so I can definitely find out if that is some sort of stipulation.

I've never seen anything in writing about it. It was just something my professor had told us about, so she could have been misinformed.

You haven't learned that nursing professors are idiots by now? I believe 0.0001% of what comes out of their mouth. I've had one good lecture professor, maybe 5 clinical instructors.

CinciX12;668959 wrote:You haven't learned that nursing professors are idiots by now? I believe 0.0001% of what comes out of their mouth. I've had one good lecture professor, maybe 5 clinical instructors.

My professor is the same as my clinical instructor. She's actually really good and very knowledgable. However, she doesn't work for the VA system. So I don't think not knowing about their hiring practices makes her an idiot.

charliehustle14;668954 wrote:I've never seen anything in writing about it. It was just something my professor had told us about, so she could have been misinformed.

Yea, I don't think there's anything to that. VA's don't typically get many newly licensed RN's, simply for the reason you stated earlier. It's a different type of nursing than you get in your typical hospital nursing job. VA's are mainly long-term, hospice, psych and outpatient.

Another nice perk for the VA nurse is 8hrs of annual leave per pay period.

I saw that Cleveland State, Akron and Kent have the accelerated Bachelor's programs. Anyone know much about those? The thought of coming back to Ohio isn't really what I want to do but if I had to I probably would. I love California and really don't want to leave.

Or does anyone know any other Heath Care jobs that are sorta in demand per say. I'd really like to get into that field. I've looked at RT's and Physical Therapists. I don't know what all the require.