Job Hunting

In order to understand Darren's job search, you need to understand how varied CRNA (Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist) jobs can be.  Most CRNA's work in a practice under an Anesthesiologist.  In some practices the anesthesiologist let the CRNA's do everything, and in some they don't let the CRNS's do anything.  As Darren says, they are just "Chart Jockey's".   In some places they can do spinals, epidural, and regional blocks.  And some places they just intubate and extubate, while the Docs (Anesthesiologists) do all the good stuff- like spinals, epidurals, and regional blocks (the hardest).  It's all very complicated, but basically how much you can do as a CRNA is called your "scope of practice".  It is very important to get as wide of a scope of practice so you have a wider range of skills, which leads to the better jobs, and better pay.   Now, in some hospitals, there are only CRNA's.   They run the show. They get respect, and get to make all the decisions and do everything. Basically, they get to do their job. The down side to this is it is a lot more responsibility. They have to be good at their job and know what they are doing, because it all comes down on the CRNA.  Typically you need a couple of years of experience before you can get hired on at an all CRNA practice- and it takes a certain kind of person.
 Different jobs are good for different people.  Some people are happy just going to work and letting the Doc tell them everything to do. Darren, however, is not.  He wants to work at a facility where there is little medical direction.  The way he puts it is, "I want to do my job, I want to do what I was trained to do." Our end goal is to get a job at an all CRNA practice. 
 
 Let me tell you a little bit about our job search journey. Lets start a year and a half ago when Darren started clinicals and voluntarily signed up to go to all the outside rotations without even talking to me about it.  Remember when Darren was gone ALL the time- yea, that was all voluntarily.  But Darren had a plan.  He wanted to get the best experience possible so he could get the job he wanted.  It was hard when all the other student husbands were home and Darren was gone.  He kept telling me, "It will pay off babe."  I thought, "It had better!"  One of his rotations was 8 hours away in Marianna, Florida, at an all CRNA practice.  He was gone 6 weeks. It was the hardest 6 weeks of school.  He went to Tampa for 4 weeks, and Davenport for 4 weeks.  All the clinical rotations have given him pretty good numbers.  For example:

So we started looking for jobs last year in Sept.  We were hoping to have a job by Thanksgiving or Christmas.  My mom said, "Look at Provo and draw a 6 hour circle around Provo and try to live within that circle."   The more we looked, the more we realized that was not going to happen.  Our search widened and widened till we were applying pretty much everywhere in the US.  By Thanksgiving other students were getting jobs and Darren and I were getting pretty discouraged. He had applied to about 40 jobs.  Our family prayed and fasted that we could get a job by Christmas so that we could relax and enjoy Christmas.  I had a specific impression that there was a special job out there for Darren and it wouldn't become available till January.  So we could enjoy Christmas.  It brought me a lot of peace.  Darren still applied like crazy.  The beginning of January Darren's phone started ringing and the e-mails started pouring in.  He had 3 serious potential jobs.  By the 2nd week in Jan. he had 2 interviews set up and 1 job offer in Bay City, Michigan. His job offers were in Hermistan, Oregon, and Bradford, Pennsylvania. We weren't really interested in Michigan.  Pennsylvania would be a fun place to live.  But we were REALLY hoping to get the Oregon job.  It is an all CRNA job and pretty much Darren's dream job.   Oregon flew Darren out to interview.  They wanted me to come too, but Marilyn and Malinda were coming for our girls week.  So I didn't go.  The next week Pennsylvania flew Darren, me and Gabe out to interview.  It was fun to be together, but Gabe made it next to impossible to enjoy going out to eat.  

Darren and Gabe on the tram to the airport.  Love those 2!

When we arrived at the hotel Gabe was being so cute I couldn't resist taking these pictures.

Little did I know what was to happen in just a few moments.

Shortly after this picture he was playing on the bed and reached over to play with the phone and fell off the bed.  He hit hard and was crying pretty bad.  I was pretty sure he broke his arm.

So we spent our first night at the ER at the hospital where Darren would be interviewing the next day. 

Yes, it was broken. They put it in a splint and told us to get it in a cast when we got home. The hospital was paying for all our meals so I was super excited to go somewhere nice to eat for dinner.  I ended up getting a sandwich from Arby's at 11.

  At least Gabe was cute and the ER staff was really nice. 
Anyways, Darren interviewed the next day and the day after that we went and looked at houses.  Stay tuned to see what job we ended up with....