CRNA at St. Francis

I am happy to report that I will be beginning my career as a CRNA at St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center in Hartford, CT.  I interviewed here in early 2012 when I was staying with Chuck during my school rotation at Danbury Hospital .  We don't get the opportunity to rotate to St. Francis as students at Columbia so I interviewed for a position at this hospital without knowing what it will actually be like (everyone is nice during an interview!).  It is a level one medical center, it is a teaching hospital and, most importantly, it is less than a 10 minute drive from our apartment :)  I have signed on to work 40 hours a week and I have the option of taking call shifts if I want them.  I am excited (and nervous) to start - wish me luck!

P. Redfield, CRNA

27 months ago I was much more tan, I was nervous about getting lost on the subway, I didn't know the dose of succinylcholine (or what it did) and I thought that living with an 80-year-old in an apartment with no air conditioning in NYC wouldn't be that bad - I was so new.  On August 14th 2012 I finished up my last clinical day at NYU, I rode my bike back to my apartment (I am no longer afraid of the subway but I am familiar enough with it to know that it is nearly impossible to get from my upper west side apartment to a mid town east hospital efficiently) and finished packing up all of my belongings.  The next morning dad came and picked me, and all of my stuff, up in his truck and we drove to Put to pick up my car and a few boxes of things that never quite made it down to Manhattan after I moved back from LA.  Then we drove to my new apartment (Chuck had moved in at the beginning of August) in West Hartford!  I then buckled down for four weeks of studying for my boards.  After you graduate from a nurse anesthesia school you have to pass a national certification exam to ensure that you really did learn everything you were supposed to.  Columbia sets up their program so that the first year is didactic (just classes) and then the second year is clinical (working in the hospital).  As we all know, tests of book knowledge don't always line up very well with what you actually do in day-to-day practice so the information on that exam was mainly the stuff I hadn't seen in a year!  Ugh.  I had taken a review course back in June so I was armed with a study plan and for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week that is exactly what I did - it was PAINFUL.  And then on September 19th at 2pm it happened - I took my exam and passed!!!!!!

I am now officially a Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist (CRNA)!  The exams are self scheduled which means that as soon as I actually graduated (August 14th) Columbia sent a letter to the American Association of Nurse Anesthetists (AANA) to let them know I had completed my school requirements.  The AANA then sent a letter to the National Board of Certification and Re-certification for Nurse Anesthetists (NBCRNA) to let them know I was eligible to sit for my certification exam.  The NBCRNA then sent me an email to let me know that I was eligible and that I needed to find the nearest Pearson VUE testing center and sign up to take my exam.  Pearson VUE is just a professional test-giving company.  You show up and give them two forms of photo ID, they take your picture, scan your palm, take away all of your stuff (purse, phone, last minute study notes, etc) and then put you in a cubicle with earplugs and a computer that you use to take your test.  The test is "adaptive" which means that the computer gives you a question and if you get it correct then the next question is harder, if you get it wrong then the next question is easier.  The computer keeps giving you questions until you are getting about 50% correct and 50% wrong so it knows your knowledge level.  If this level meets the minimum requirement then you pass and if not then it is back to the drawing board :(  Since I didn't know when I would be able to sign up for my exam (paperwork could have gotten lost or I could have filled something out incorrectly and that would have caused a delay) or if I would pass on the first try, I gave myself a little cushion between my goal test-taking date and starting work.  I have spent the last two weeks sleeping, cleaning, finding my way around West Hartford and trying to enjoy the excitement that came with passing while it lasts!