We experience a lot of transitions in life: childhood to adulthood, in and out of relationships, change jobs or roles. Transitions can be planned or spontaneous, exciting or terrifying, easy or hard... or a combination of them all!
Nurse practitioners experience a transition when they graduate from NP school and start their first jobs. Not only are they transitioning from being a student to a new graduate clinician, but they are also transitioning roles in healthcare care: from nurse to clinician, from Registered Nurse to Nurse Practitioner. This new role transition is very unique among clinicians. Not many other clinicians have to navigate the student-to-graduate transition and the transition in roles.
To help you make that shift in roles, we’ve created a limited series podcast called Making the Shift: From RN to NP. Why is this transition potentially associated with such anticipation and dread, along with successes and challenges? Why did we make this podcast?
Several factors make this time uniquely challenging for NPs:
- Change in Responsibilities: Moving from the RN role to an NP entails a significant shift in responsibilities. Your scope of practice has now broadened to include diagnosis and treatment. No more nursing diagnoses and nursing care plans. We get to make medical diagnoses and treat clients with pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic interventions. For nurses who have been told for years (or decades!) that they are not allowed to diagnose - this can be tricky!
- Change in Expertise - from expert to novice: Many NP students are expert nurses with years and years of nursing experience. We are familiar with and comfortable in our role in our respective hospital units. It can be a jarring experience to go from being an expert nurse to a novice clinician. This is an unfamiliar and uncomfortable trajectory to experience as a healthcare professional as we are used to growing in our expertise over time.
- Change in Community: A significant but often unmentioned challenge in the transition from RN to NP is the change in workplace buddies. As an RN, you’re in the trenches with your co-workers every shift. You’ve worked with them through tough seasons and been bonded (maybe trauma bonded?) by shared experiences on your unit. Starting in a new role in a new workplace takes away that community of co-workers and can be isolating while you're finding your people in your new job.
We know making the shift from RN to NP can be challenging, so we created a limited series podcast with you in mind! We brought in 6 nurse practitioners who have made that transition and want to share the good, the bad, and the ugly about their experiences. They don’t hold back on sharing how they navigated this tricky time and give practical advice for transitioning well.
Who is this podcast series for?
- NP students who wanted to prepare for the season of transition and gain insight into the process. This podcast series is for you!
- New-grad NPs in the liminal space between graduation and starting their new job. They’re studying for boards, waiting on licensing and credentialing, and want to become more equipped to make the transition well. This podcast series is for you!
- NPs in the first 3, 6, 9, and 12 months of their first job may be struggling to keep up with all of the taxing requirements of the job, battling imposter syndrome every day and wondering, “Why did I leave the bedside?” This is for you! We hope you feel encouraged and strengthened to keep going and thrive during this challenging time.
In addition to the podcast, we’ve created an NP Clinical Resource Guide to help you with a quick reference guide during those first few months/years of practice. This guide walks you through a diagnostic decision-making process for 15 of the most common undifferentiated chief complaints. You know the ones we’re talking about… the ones that make you get heartburn when you see them on your schedule (dizziness, anyone?). In addition to the diagnostic guides, we also included practical references that you can use every day, including pharmacology tables. We want to help you be as successful as possible during these first few years as an NP.
Click here to sign up to receive your free NP Clinical Resource Guide and watch or listen to all six episodes of Making the Shift: From RN to NP on the Hippo Education app, YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify!
P.S. Check out our NP education page for even more practice-changing education!
Happy Shifting, fellow NPs!
