Post-operative cardiac surgery — CABG, valve replacement, transplant — plus balloon pumps, Impella and often ECMO.
Post-operative cardiac surgery — CABG, valve replacement, transplant — plus balloon pumps, Impella and often ECMO.
A fresh heart arrives from theatre and the first four hours are chest tubes, pacing wires, bleeding checks and titrating three or four drips at once. Once the patient stabilises the pace drops sharply. Units running ECMO or Impella add a second layer of monitoring that never quite lets up.
Whether the unit takes fresh hearts, which mechanical support devices are in use, and open-chest management expectations.
Fresh post-op heart experience is a genuinely narrow skill set. A general ICU nurse is not a substitute, and submitting one wastes everyone's week.
Answering these in the req itself shortens the process considerably, because they are the questions that otherwise surface at offer stage and cause declines: Whether they will be assigned fresh post-op hearts in the first week, device competency expectations, and open-chest protocols.
Contract for census swings, leave coverage and seasonal surge. Per diem to protect ratios without expanding core FTE. Permanent when the seat is structural. The expensive mistake is running contract labour for eighteen months on a role that was always permanent.
Registered nursing is covered by the Nurse Licensure Compact in most of the country, so a multistate license lets a nurse work across member states without a new application. Thirteen jurisdictions sit outside it — Alaska, California, DC, Hawaii, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New York, Oregon, Puerto Rico, American Samoa and the Northern Mariana Islands — and in those markets every out-of-state nurse needs a single-state license first. Those are the markets where reqs stay open longest.
Every candidate is spoken to before you see them, with licensure for your state, certifications and unit-specific competency confirmed before submittal. We screen to the credential the unit actually needs rather than the title on the posting. Rates sit inside the ranges on our published cost breakdown.
BLS, ACLS; CCRN preferred; CSC or CMC valued.
1:1 for fresh post-op hearts, 1:2 once stable.
Fresh post-op heart experience is a genuinely narrow skill set. A general ICU nurse is not a substitute, and submitting one wastes everyone's week.
Whether they will be assigned fresh post-op hearts in the first week, device competency expectations, and open-chest protocols.
See all nursing specialties or our nursing staffing overview.
Tell us the ratio, the equipment and the start date, and we will tell you the realistic fill window.