Enter to Win “CRNA School Admissions: The Cold Hard Facts” for FREE!
Every month we give away our amazing eBook “CRNA School Admissions: The Cold Hard Facts“ for free to the person who has the best written entry on why you want to become a CRNA. All you have to do in order to be considered is tell us about your current work experience and why you want to become a CRNA. All entries will be listed in our student blog section on our website, and your name will be kept anonymous. Winners will be notified via email along with their free eBook, “CRNA School Admissions: The Cold Hard Facts“. Below is a list of criteria for your entry.
What Needs to be Included
- Minimum 500 words
- Current work experience
- Why you want to become a CRNA
- Anything you have done to start preparing for CRNA school
How to Submit Your Entry
- After you have written your entry please send it to us using our Contact Us page.
- Please include “CRNA School Admissions Giveaway” at the top of your essay.
Best of luck to all of you!
A Winning Entry
I became enamored by anesthesia by mistake. I had realized I no longer wanted to build my career in psychiatry, but instead I wanted to become an intensive care nurse and then see where my career takes me from there. When I interviewed in a cardiac surgical ICU the nurse manager said she didn’t think my experience in psychiatric nursing was the best fit for the unit but she accepted nurses from the cardiac step-down and operating room. I had always dreaded medical-surgical nursing, so I decided to try the operating room. As I was getting comfortable with scrubbing, I started to notice what was going on at the patients’ heads beyond the blue drapes. I felt like the scene in Nightmare before Christmas where the main character sings “What’s This” and is completely captivated by this new world. It was soon after that I realized I wanted to be a CRNA. I wanted to take on the most challenging and complex specialty in advance practice nursing. I want to reach the pinnacle of what a bedside nurse can become.
I am completing my first application for school, and I am only applying to one program this year. I have over 3000 hours of OR experience working alongside nurse anesthetists and anesthesiologists plus eight hours of shadow time in the OR. I have almost three years of critical care experience with six years total nursing experience. I took two graduate classes recommended by the program (biostatistics and A&P) and received a 4.0 on both. I have also started trying to bulk up on my humanitarian work and obtained my CCRN in 2015.
My favorite part of ICU nursing is when I come in and get to have a complicated 1:1. I love the detective work I feel like that must be done to keep the patient safe, and the meticulous nature that is needed. I love being able to anticipate when something is about to go wrong and fix it before anything can happen. I love the detailed knowledge required to titrate drips and understand exactly why everything is occurring with my patient. I love the autonomy in ICU nursing, but also the total teamwork needed to make sure that every patient on the unit gets the best care. I love ICU nursing but I miss the flow of the operating room. I miss the interesting cases and the way that every procedure and surgery is done to save or enhance a patient’s life.
Becoming a CRNA is becoming the ICU nurse, respiratory therapist, intensivist, and pharmacist. It is working completely alone but also entirely with a team. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I would love every minute of being a CRNA and I hope I would be considered for your book giveaway. I am determined to become a CRNA whether I get into school for summer 2017 or five years from now. I can’t imagine wanting to be anything else.