Review: The Nursing Spectrum Networking and Educational Event

On Tuesday April 7, 2009 Nursing Spectrum hosted a networking and educational event at Dave and Buster's in Philadelphia, PA. As providence would have it, I was able to attend my first “dog and pony show” as a nurse. I've attended other such professional events in my previous incarnation. What surprised me was how small this event was, given the location and the time of year. I'll elaborate...

For all its faults, Philadelphia is a major university town. With Penn, Drexel, and Temple all within blocks of each other, there are three nursing programs right there. Jefferson hospital, CCP, Frankford-Torresdale, and Northeast hospital each have programs. Just within the city limits, that adds up to a lot of newly minted nurses. There were very few hospitals advertising positions, and the ones that had vacancies were looking for specialty nurses with years of experience. Only two hospitals were seeking graduate nurses, one southern hospital and one regional hospital in a less than desirable city west of Philadelphia. No aspersions on the hospital itself, it's just that the city has been struggling with a depressed economy and rising crime rate for over a generation.

Another trend I noted was a disproportionate number of home care agencies. I think home care is a vital part of nursing and I believe that many facility-acquired infections can be avoided by allowing patients who can go home to receive treatment at home. But it seems that home care nursing is one of those areas where people look at you and wonder “why aren't you working in a hospital?” Also, how many graduate nurses could find jobs in home care? A new nurse needs to be around other nurses and I know when I first started, the last thing I wanted was be alone with a patient. I also noticed that the “grandmomma” of home care nursing, the Visiting Nurse Association, was absent.

The good news is that creative thinking and technology are expanding the profile of patients who can stay home. I spoke to a rep from a home infusion company who told me that her patients received total parenteral nutrition and chemotherapy at home in addition to traditional intravenous therapies. The only therapy they don't support is blood transfusion. I was truly overjoyed to learn that patients could now receive chemo and TPN at home. I've met many patients on chemotherapy who wanted only to be in their own home. I'm definitely following up with them.

As far as the “networking” part of it, many attendees traveled in pairs. I think traveling in pairs to a networking event is a defensive strategy against meeting new people. I also noticed that some people, you know who you are, took the lists of open positions from unmanned booths. Shame on you! Those lists were not for taking. You know you are stealing it when you shark an unattended booth a couple of times before you slip the list into your bag, all casual like.

I did not participate in the educational part of the session for three reasons. First, the continuing education credits I would earn will expire with my license this fall. Second was that the topic “business etiquette” didn't grab me. I've been jobbing for over 20 years. I don't need to be told that it's shabby practice to talk on your cell phone while caring for a patient. Third, I had to pick up the cat from the vet.

Impressions: there are shockingly few jobs for new and recent grads in Philadelphia and budgets for marketing schwag must be in the negative number territory as I didn't even score a “Nursing Spectrum” tote bag. But I am glad I attended because it generated some new ideas for career direction. I look forward to the next event.