The first travel nurse assignment I was offered and accepted was in Connecticut. I specifically selected that area so I could spend time near my son and his significant other since they live in New York City. I also have family and friends in Connecticut and New Hampshire which I hadn’t seen in some time, so my goal was to visit with them as well.
My current travel career is a Registered Nurse (RN) Case Manager in the hospital setting. It can also be referred to as Discharge Planning. My daily activities include assessing patients and/or family members in order to determine what the patient’s baseline function was prior to coming to the hospital for their illness, accident or scheduled procedure. Once that information has been obtained, it can be determined what may be the safest hospital discharge plan for each specific patient. Discharge planning may include the need for home equipment such as oxygen, walkers, commodes, wheelchairs or other durable medical equipment (DME). Patients may also need to go to rehabilitation centers prior to returning home. Some may need to go to Skilled Nursing Facilities (SNF) and others may be able to go home with Home Health Care (HHC). HHC can include one or all of the following: in home skilled nursing, physical therapy, occupational therapy or social work to name a few.
Typically travel nurse contracts are 13.5 weeks. I have worked at 5 different hospitals thus far and have stayed 4-6 months at each one. Meaning I “extend my contract” for whatever my reasons may have been at the time: I liked the pay, I liked where I was working and/or living, I had family or friends in the area, I had more places I wished to see as a tourist in that area etc.
Applying for travel nurse jobs is like obtaining any job. My recruiter must submit my resume, hospital representative must review it and an interview is set up if they wish to move forward with me filling their need for staffing. After the interview, hospital representative lets my recruiter know and we set a start date, or not. I have had one hospital decline me after my interview. It was for a NY position (yay closer to my son). It was the absolute first interview I had, ever, for travel nursing. I remember the interview like it was yesterday. I was in my car, at my gym parking lot on car speaker phone. Their report of declination was they felt when they asked a question there was too much of a pause on their end before they received my responses. I was experiencing the same on my end. Hindsight is 20/20. I should have shared that during the interview, but did not. Technology was not my friend in that instance.
Needless to say, I have never done another interview on speaker phone in my car. I’ll also throw in “everything happens for a reason” here. I had to apply for my NY nursing license as they are not a Nursing Compact state. It took 16 months for the state of NY to approve it! Even if they wanted to hire me for that position I interviewed for, I couldn’t have taken the assignment as I would not have had a NY nursing license in time. That is what I would refer to as a delay!
I mentioned Nursing Compact state and I suspect you’d like some clarity on what that is. I’ll paint the picture. Back in 1994 when I obtained my first nursing license it was in NH. If I wanted to work in any of the other 49 states, I would have had to apply to the particular state, pay the fee, provide proof of my Continuing Education Credits (CEUs) and nursing employment. Then await a nursing license to arrive in my mailbox via the postal service.
“Nurse Compact” legislature was initiated in 1999. As of this writing, 41 of the 50 states are participants. What that means is if I have a nursing license in a Compact state, I can apply for a Compact nursing license in addition to my state of residence nurse licensure. In doing so, it allows me to have a valid nursing license in my state of residence as well as the 40 other states which are included in the Compact.
The opposite is true if I live in a state which does not participate with the Nurse Compact. I would have to apply directly to every state I desired to work in to obtain a license, just like 1994.
I currently have a Compact nursing license, however, CT was not a Compact state. I had to do all the things: apply for a nursing license, pay the fee, send CEUs and work history and await a CT nurse license. When one has a travel nurse contract start date, awaiting the nursing license can cause a sense of anxiety because it is not known if the license will be obtained prior to the agreed upon start date. See NY example above. If I’m not working, I’m not earning an income but I have to pay bills. You get the drift.
While waiting for the RN license, a great time distraction is seeking housing for your anticipated assignment. Many websites are available to tap into to assist with the investigation of housing and you’re likely familiar with some. AirBNB, VRBO, Facebook Travel Nurse Housing and Furnished Finder are all resources I use on a frequent basis. My preference is to use Furnished Finder whenever possible as their direct audience is for folks in the medical travel profession. In this instance, my must have criteria were for a safe, pet friendly rental with close driving distance to the hospital, in Connecticut in the summer time. If you are not or have never been a New Englander, you may not understand that there are only 3 months of summer in New England and everybody vacations hard during those months. What happens then? You’re a captive audience and the housing rates go up and availability is extremely limited.
I was not able to obtain what I desired in my fantasy of travel nurse housing, Namely a house or apartment with the above mentioned criteria at a reasonable price. I was able to find a pet friendly hotel with a gym and an in room kitchen which included a full size refrigerator, microwave, and stove. Laundry was downstairs. Drive to the hospital was about twenty minutes. It was more than I wanted to spend on my housing rental per month but as mentioned, options were few and far between. I figured I could always continue to search for other housing rentals during my stay if necessary. I booked it Danno! Oh, and my CT nursing license showed up before my July assignment date. Win win!