Travel Nurse Talk: Finding Your Place in Healthcare and Gaining Valuable Experience from Med/Surg Travel Nursing
Travel nurse Kelli Senseney has been travel nursing for 13 years. She continues to learn and advance her nursing education. Soon, she will add the nurse practitioner title to her resume. In this article, Kelli shares some life lessons about traveling as a Med/Surg nurse. Med Surg Travel Nursing is where it’s at.
I really lucked out with travel nursing.
I’ve been traveling since 2004 — I got into it by accident, but have had an amazing experience. Certainly, it helped me move into my next career goal: becoming a nurse practitioner.
LiquidAgents stands by my side throughout every turn of my travel nursing career. They’ve been good to me.
Travel nursing gives you such a wide view of nursing – I think it can really help nurses find their place in healthcare.
Once, I traveled to a health system that expected their nurses to take up to 10 patients a piece on a Telemetry floor. The nurses were mostly new, extremely stressed out, working a lot of extra hours. As a result, many of them were questioning their decisions to become nurses. They were wondering if this is really what they wanted to do with their lives. They wondered if they were practicing safely or if they were even making a difference.
The management at this hospital often said that it was like this everywhere and that there was simply nothing to be done about it. However, when I left that hospital, I referred 5 nurses to come work as travel nurses at a hospital where the maximum patient load was 6 (and even that was rare). They came with me and it was a great experience. They were able to realize why that they love being nurses, and that with the right support and the right staffing, a hospital is a rewarding place. Travel nursing gives you a wide view of nursing – I think it can really help nurses find their place in healthcare.
Traveling as a Med/Surg nurse, you get a ton of experience.
While I normally do cardiac, right now I’m working Med/Surg. Traveling as a Med/Surg nurse, you get a ton of experience. You get exposed to different hospitals’ ways of doing things and interact with such a wide variety of patients. At some hospitals, you may only have a specific patient load, but at others, you might get overflow patients or float more often than other nurses. I value that experience.
Ask your recruiter if they can put you in touch with any nurses who have been to hospitals you’re considering.
My advice to new travel nurses is to ask your recruiter if they can put you in touch with any nurses who have been to hospitals you’re considering. Travel nurses know and support each other. We’re the ones that have been there, on the ground floor. We can help other travelers know what to expect. Certainly, the numbers only tell one side of the story.
I am grateful for all the good friends I’ve made through med surg travel nursing.
I still keep in touch with old friends. We go to each other’s weddings, meet up whenever we can. There are also a number of professional contacts that prove invaluable throughout my career. Med Surg travel nursing provides an unforgettable experience, every day.
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