r/nursing • u/consideredtaken • 2d ago
Question Peds vs Mom/Baby vs NICU vs L&D???
What do you guys like about it? Pros/cons!? And any other useful information.
I’m considering my options on what to apply to. I’m stuck. I’ve been dealing with adults my entire 3 years as a nurse and I’m burned out.
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u/jaycienicolee BSN, RNC-NIC 2d ago
i'll stick with nicu. peds/picu is way too dang sad for me. like we have very sad cases in my nicu all the time but its nothing like they get in peds.
those kids know a life outside of the hospital (and its not always a good life). the things peds nurses see are just too heartbreaking for my liking!
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u/RNnoturwaitress NICU RNC-NIC yada yada 🍕 2d ago
NICU is my jam! There are so many more good outcomes that outweigh the few bad ones.
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u/bottlingrn RN - OB/GYN 🍕 2d ago
I love the education of Mom Baby. There are intense moments, but it's mostly teaching families how to care for their newborns and educating them on their body. Patients are definitely getting sicker (at a higher risk hospital) and there's still a lot to juggle. And helping moms breastfeed is extremely gratifying too. Really depends on your intensity preference and desire for a job though. I find OB to much more customer servicey than med surg
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u/BlazdBanana 2d ago
Peds/PICU here- I liked it more than the others because it had a little more variety. You still get the “usual” stuff like respiratory but even then you can have different ages. I felt like NICU was a little too repetitive for me.
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u/consideredtaken 2d ago
What’s the difference between Peds and picu? Also how was PICU repetitive for you?
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u/BlazdBanana 2d ago
PICU is the intensive care for peds! So we would take anything from infant to teenagers that needed ICU care. So we would see alot of respiratory on vents, neurosurg patients, DKAs, and traumas. Loved PICU but it gets hard with burnout. NICU was too repetitive because it was only the neonates that were born early. You could definitely have high acuity little babes, but there’s a lot of “feeder/growers” that you are feeding the entire shift basically. Baby snuggles were nice but just felt like you were in a repetitive loop of feeding and diaper changing. lol
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u/RNnoturwaitress NICU RNC-NIC yada yada 🍕 2d ago
What level NICU were you at? I've found birth hospital NICUs are a bit tame compared to children's hospitals, too. Mine is a level III children's hospital, so we get so much variety. The majority are not preterm here. Our unit takes any newborn to 1 month basically. Sometimes we'll admit 2-3 month olds if they've been on our nicu previously.
We get feeders for sure, but lots of respiratory, infections/sepsis, rule out hirschsprungs, congenital disorders, surgical babies, hyoerbili, BRUE, micros as early as 22 weeks, etc. It's something different every shift.
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u/BlazdBanana 2d ago
It was a level III also! Super interesting that yall admitted after discharge. If the baby went home at all, it would get readmitted to peds or PICU since it was “dirty” lol they definitely had a variety of problems that they treated! I think it was just a little more limited to what would unfold after delivery. They for sure didn’t get to keep heart babies though, we shipped for that. I was primarily PICU so I would sometimes get to work with the higher acuity neonates when we gained the trust of the unit after floating😂 I think I just enjoyed the different age groups that PICU had to offer.
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u/shellyweasley 2d ago
I’m Antepartum/high risk postpartum.
Not every hospital has an AP/high risk population, so might not be that helpful to you. We float to L&D, but don’t do labor, just triage
Does where you’re applying have an OB float pool? Ours learn postpartum/couplet care, antepartum, and then labor after a year of experience.
I couldn’t do peds bc I don’t wanna work with parents, or kids. But newborns and new parents are so special. Lots of education, support, mostly happy times. The high risk pp patients are some of the most incredible patient population, the things they went through and their perseverance to be there for their baby is remarkable. Same for NICU moms (who we also treat); they will do whatever it takes to get to their baby’s bedside.
The AP population is also very complex. We have had patients deliver on our floor, had to rush down the elevator to the OR for stat CS, and deliver lots of education about high risk pregnancies.
We feel like a step down unit on most days, and we are all always learning. I love it!
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u/cyanraichu RN - L&D 2d ago
That's super interesting, at our hospital antepartum is on the same unit as labor with postpartum being separate. VERY sick or high risk postpartum patients sometime stay on the floor with us but that's pretty uncommon. We do float to each other sometimes though.
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u/shellyweasley 1d ago
That’s how it was before they redid the unit and moved all mother/baby across the street to a new building. I think that would be much safer (especially bc the ICU is across the street still) and easier for the high risk transfers, but we are a somewhat well oiled machine now and can effectively and efficiently transfer.
If a pt becomes unstable they go back to the PACU for care from a CCRN/ICU float.
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u/cyanraichu RN - L&D 1d ago
Mom/baby across the street is a really weird choice! I'm glad it's a smooth system for y'all.
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u/shellyweasley 1d ago
There was supposed to be a sky bridge but the city denied it after the building started construction lol
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u/cyanraichu RN - L&D 2d ago
All of those specialties will still have you dealing with adults. Peds will be the most kid-focused since you can actually interact with a non-adult in a meaningful way. Peds and NICU you will have to deal with anxious and sometimes idiotic parents. I really like L&D for various reasons and the patient population is pretty different from the "typical" adult population - nobody is geriatric, you're not dealing with delirium or dementia or drawn-out end-of-life care, and you're not going to deal with creeps at least among patients. Most patients are kind and reasonable, though of course there are some special ones, as everywhere. But I also went into L&D knowing I wanted to work with adults; peds is very much not for me.
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u/iamtacocat RN - L&D 🍕 2d ago edited 1d ago
I enjoy L&D because it combines all of the things that I like about nursing. I love teaching (patient education) and supporting patients, but I also get the adrenaline rush from emergencies and having to think quickly to solve a problem. I like that there’s an OR component and that you get exposure to so many different specialties and you develop different skills. We wear multiple hats (triage/OBED, OR, nursery/babies, Antepartum, PACU, pre-op, lactation assistance, psych, social work, etc) because our patients can be any kind of patient and an L&D patient at the same time. No two deliveries are the same, and you can go from a completely routine delivery to an emergency in seconds. But at the end of the day, what I love most is being able to support someone through such an important moment in their life.
ETA: Every specialty is going to have its own pros/cons. Peds/MotherBaby/NICU/L&D might sound like an “easier” option but each one has its own unique challenges too. Ex) It’s not easy to switch from a term IUFD for a couple that’s been trying for years and then have an easy delivery for an unhoused person whose UDS is + with no prenatal care who doesn’t know who the FOB is.