For Rid and Dust (and any other medic/rn's out there)

[Dustdevil]

One word of caution is that some nursing instructors don't like medics and will give you a hard time.

Oooh, good point! Not all nursing instructors have such a bias, but it is indeed pretty common. I had one nursing prof who didn't like medics, didn't like men, and didn't like white people. Let me tell you, that was a tough semester! :shock:

Because of that, you will definitely not want to do a lot of mouthing off about your medic experience in school. Resist the temptation to tell war stories in class. Try to stay back and blend in with the rest of the students.

Somebody mentioned nursing and the military. I was always under the impression that you needed a BSN to serve as an officer in the military. It wasn't always that way because my mother was a Navy nurse in World War II and she was a hospital trained RN. She was discharged as a Lieutenant JG.

It seems to vary. Army is all BSN in the active duty. However, National Guard (and I believe reserves too) will take ASN's on a case by case basis. Last I heard, Air Force would also take ADN's on a case by case basis, depending upon need, but it is not common. And you can forget making O-3 before you earn a BSN. But back in WWII, hospital programme nurses were the norm. There were no ADN's, and BSN's were much less common.

[chbare]

Spock & Dustdevil, you are correct, you can join the Army Guard as an ADN. (must be an NLN accredited school) You start as a butter bar, but you cannot advance beyond O3 and are eventually forced to get your BSN. I have heard that some nursing instructors will give medics a hard time and one of my medic friends is getting pretty roughed up in his last semester of school. I am glad that I had a great experience regarding EMS in nursing school. Our instructors actually had paramedics come in and do a presentation on pre hospital trauma care during the trauma portion of school. We also spent a day with a paramedic crew just to get a taste of what they did and our instructors had paramedics come in and do prehospital scenarios on a dummy just to give us an ideah of what paramedics do in the field. That is one of the things that I loved about nursing school, we rotated through multiple areas and I felt that we recieved a well rounded education.

Take care,

chbare.

[Ridryder 911]

You are guys are correct in some instructors are not fond of Paramedics, although I can understand why. I was one of the "first" guinea pigs about 17 yrs ago in the one of the first "bridge" programs. Although, the nursing school college did not have the paramedic program, many of the hospitals at that time wanted to have experienced medics as RN's, so they "funded" additional spots to try medics to RN's.

There were a few select ones, and out of the 12 that was selected 3 of us made it through the first semester. The problem was the mouth(s) on the medics. Bragging rights of "how they saved lives" and "they didn't have to have orders, to do everything as well as I started ____14 g IV's..etc..". I found out real soon, the old saying when in Rome, comes true. In fact the more you keep your mouth shut and appear ignorant the better! You are a male entering "their sisterhood and profession" .... Like I said, some truly believe it is a calling....not just a profession, and you are coming to their profession, they are not coming to yours, and they really don't care how much training you have. Remember, unlike EMS they have to have a masters degree just to teach.

Over-all, I was lucky all but one was really nice to medics. Most did feel intimidated when discussing cardiac etc. and since we were the new ones, many observed our behavior and discussed the differences in detail about how "we(EMS)" perceive things so much different than the traditional student. I guess it helped, the program is still going and successful. I know of some medics have learned not to even ever tell some programs they are EMT's...

Again, good luck .... get those additional classes and apply early.

R/r 911