As a I go into my senior year, I wanted to share some of my tips and tricks that I have learned over the past year on how to survive nursing school. First of, the first week of any semester can be a bit overwhelming. Even as I started this year, I was overcome with the amount of information they were giving out. I attend Pitt State and the way they start of every semester is at least of week of pure classes and no clinicals. They use this time to throw as much information at you so that you can be ready to start clinicals. For example, this semester I am taking obstetrics (OB), pediatric (peds) and older adult nursing. The assessments for these types of clients are different then your typical inpatient assessment. In order to be ready to attend clinicals next week, the professors need to teach you how these clients are different and how this applies to your assessment.
For the juniors, in your first semester of nursing school they expand this week into a month. Don't get too excited, this month is just as overwhelming as the first week I just described. You easily have ten test over the course of this month and will learn so much in order to be ready to start those clinicals. My tip for surviving the first month is to buckle down and study hard. Make sure you do destress because in order to take care of others, you first have to take care of oneself. For sure, pay attention and try and soak up as much as you can. The information they are giving you is things that you will be using every day in the hospital setting. Things like how to start an IV or how to do dosage calculation. Make sure you bring snacks with you because they have long classes - sometimes four to five hours at a time. Food and water are important things to bring with you to class. Also, juniors you may have noticed but the nursing building is freezing so bring a sweatshirt - even in the summer. Good luck with the start of your year!
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| Stethoscope and blood pressure cuff. These are very important to learn to use as a nurse. |
