Nursing Podcast by NURSING.com (NRSNG) (NCLEX® Prep for Nurses and Nursing Students)

Hydrocodone/Acetaminophen (Norco): NCLEX Must-Knows 15.09.2026 3min

Hydrocodone/acetaminophen (Norco) is one of the most common meds you'll see for moderate-to-severe and post-op pain. In this MedMaster episode: therapeutic and pharmacologic class, how the combo lets you use less opioid, mechanism of action at opiate receptors in the CNS, and the nursing must-knows — monitor for hypotension and respiratory depression, never exceed 4g of acetaminophen in 24 hours, and keep Narcan (naloxone) in mind as the reversal agent. Get your free download of the 50 most commonly prescribed medications — the must-knows for the NCLEX and real life on the floor: https://nursing.com/50meds

Nursing Students Are Asking AI the Questions They're Afraid to Ask Their Instructors 11.09.2026 11min

It's 2am, the care plan is due at 7, and a nursing student types into a chatbot: "explain preload and afterload like I'm five" — because asking out loud just feels expensive. All over the country, students are having their most honest learning conversations with a machine, and everyone's debating whether it's cheating. Wrong debate. Jon Haws RN asks the more useful question — why does asking a machine feel so much easier than asking out loud? — and delivers the honest guide: the green zone (tutoring, practice questions, explainers), the yellow zone (AI is confidently wrong — verify anything that would touch a patient; care plans; know your program's policy), the red zone (integrity, borrowed understanding, and the HIPAA rule that can end a career: never paste real patient information into AI, ever), and the office-hours script that brings your questions back to the humans. Then the question only you can answer: is the understanding actually YOURS yet? Find out free — start a SIMCLEX at SIMCLEX.com, first 15 questions on us: true adaptive engine, every Next Gen item type, the most realistic mirror of the real thing that exists. Free Green-Yellow-Red screenshot card in the show notes. Keywords: nursing students using ChatGPT, is it cheating to use AI in nursing school, AI care plans nursing, ChatGPT nursing school policy, how to use AI to study nursing, HIPAA AI nursing students, free NCLEX simulation.

The Nurses of September 11th 10.09.2026 9min

Twenty-five years ago today, rows of gurneys stood ready outside St. Vincent's Hospital — and stayed empty. Most of you listening weren't born yet. So today: no study tips, no advice, nothing to sign up for. Just the stories that belong to this profession now — the hospitals that stood ready, the largest patient influx in American hospital history at a small downtown hospital, and the nurses we lost: Captain Kathy Mazza, the OR nurse turned Port Authority commander who shot out the North Tower's glass walls so hundreds could escape, found five months later beside the patient she refused to leave — alongside Stephen Huczko, a fellow nurse-officer. Touri Bolourchi. Jean Hoadly Peterson. Lydia Bravo. Christine Egan. And the nurses still caring for 9/11 responders and survivors, twenty-five years later. This is not a history lesson. It's a handoff.

Nursing School Will Cost You Some Relationships. Nobody Warns You Which Ones 09.09.2026 10min

Somewhere between first semester and pinning, relationships end — the supportive boyfriend, the childhood best friend, sometimes the fiancé — and every cohort knows it and nobody says it out loud. Jon Haws RN says it out loud: why nursing school strains relationships in ways nobody warns you about (it doesn't just take your time — it changes your availability as a person, and growth and leaving look identical from the outside for a while), the three-question sort that separates relationships struggling to adjust from the ones showing you who they always were, and the actual scripts: the 20-minute weekly state-of-the-union, the answer to "you've changed" that has saved relationships, the voice-memo friendship downgrade, and the one artifact to hand family who "don't get it." Grieve what falls away. Don't apologize for growing. The most personal episode we've ever done. From NURSING.com. Keywords: nursing school relationships, nursing school breakup, boyfriend doesn't understand nursing school, losing friends in nursing school, nursing school changed me, dating in nursing school.

Everyone Cries in Their Car in Nursing School. Nobody Talks About Why. 07.09.2026 8min

There's a parking lot outside every nursing school in America, and in it, right now, a student is crying — convinced she's the only one. She's wrong. Jon Haws RN names the most universal unspoken ritual in nursing education: why the car (the first private space after hours of performed composure), why almost everyone does it and nobody says so (the silence IS the culture), the difference between normal release tears and the signal tears that mean it's time to get backup, and the two-word text — "parking lot" / "same" — that has carried more students through nursing school than any study guide. Every nurse you admire has a parking lot. The difference was never the crying. Note: this episode touches on student mental health; if you're struggling, in the US you can call or text 988. From NURSING.com. Keywords: crying in nursing school, nursing school stress, nursing school mental health, is nursing school supposed to be this hard, nursing student burnout, emotional exhaustion nursing school.

The Night Before Nursing School: What Nobody Says to You Out Loud 21.08.2026 9min

It's the night before nursing school. The scrubs are laid out, the bag is packed — and around 10pm the thought shows up, the one you haven't said to anybody: "What if I'm not smart enough? What if they made a mistake letting me in?" After twenty years and hundreds of thousands of nursing students, Jon Haws RN says the things nobody says out loud: why you didn't sneak in (admissions doesn't make sentimental mistakes), why feeling behind on day one is the design and not your deficit, why your "before" life — waiting tables, the office job, motherhood — counts as arriving with skills rather than starting from zero, why your reasons don't have to be noble, what to do when people in your life get weird about your growth, and why showing up scared counts completely. No study tips tonight. Just the truth, the night before. Save this episode — play it before every semester. From NURSING.com. Keywords: night before nursing school, starting nursing school scared, am I smart enough for nursing school, nursing school imposter syndrome, first day of nursing school, career change to nursing, nursing school as a mom.

The Nurse Who Noticed: How One ICU Nurse Caught America's Most Prolific Serial Killer 19.08.2026 9min

In 2003, detectives hunting one of the most prolific serial killers in American history needed something they didn't have: someone who could read an ICU medication log. The case came down to Amy Loughren, a night-shift ICU nurse. Jon Haws RN breaks down what she actually did as a clinical skill set — reading the data behind the patient, trusting a pattern over a person, speaking up inside a culture of silence, and being competent at 3am when nobody's watching — and why every one of those skills is what nursing school is building in you right now. Plus: the new true crime podcast from the NURSING.com team, MURDER ROUNDS — the healthcare killer cases told with real clinical insight, starting with the full Charles Cullen story. Follow Murder Rounds wherever you listen. Keywords: Amy Loughren, Charles Cullen, The Good Nurse true story, nurses who caught killers, nursing assessment skills, Murder Rounds podcast.

The 5-Minute Pre-Clinical Routine That Saved My Butt Every Single Shift 12.08.2026 7min

Start NURSING.com for free at: NURSING.com It's 0645, you're outside the unit, and your brain is forty open tabs. The next five minutes decide whether today is a shift or a shipwreck. Jon Haws RN shares the exact 5-minute pre-shift routine he ran before every ICU shift of his career — and taught every student he precepted: Minute 1, the story (why is this human in this bed today?). Minute 2, the numbers that matter for THIS patient. Minute 3, lines and meds. Minute 4, three real questions that change how the whole building treats you. Minute 5, the one thing you verify with your own eyes. Plus the near-miss that created the routine, the night-shift variation, and why competence is a system, not a talent. FREE printable checklist card in the show notes — sized to fit behind your badge. Keywords: nursing clinical preparation, pre-clinical checklist, nursing student clinical tips, how to prepare for clinical shift, nursing report sheet, clinical day routine. #nursingclinicals #nursingstudent #nursingschool #clinicals #studentnurse #futurenurse #nursingschooltips #firstclinical #nursetok #brainsheet #newnurse #rnstudent #nursingschoolhacks

Your Nursing School's 98% Pass Rate Isn't Lying — But It's Not Telling the Truth Either. 10.08.2026 9min

Start a FREE SIMCLEX at: SIMCLEX.com That 98% NCLEX pass rate on your school's banner is real — nobody's lying. But 98% of whom? Jon Haws RN does the math admissions tours skip: how attrition and exit-exam gates shape pass-rate statistics, why programs protect the number (the incentive, not the people, is the monster), and the one question that reveals more than any brochure: "Of students who START, how many graduate and pass first try?" Plus the mindset shift for students already in a program — your school's predictor answers THEIR question; you need your own answer — and the playbook if you're blocked at an exit-exam gate right now. Not an attack on schools. A field guide to the system you're standing in. Get your own independent read: start a SIMCLEX free — first 15 questions on us at SIMCLEX.com. Keywords: nursing school pass rate explained, nursing school attrition rate, exit exam nursing school, HESI ATI benchmark blocked graduation, how to choose a nursing school. #nursingschool #nursingstudent #futurenurse #nclex #prenursing #nursingschooladvice #hesi #ati #exitexam #nursingschoolproblems #choosingnursingschool #studentnurse #rnstudent #nursetok

The Test Shut Off at 75 and I Knew I Failed. I Was Wrong. 07.08.2026 10min

Start a FREE SIMCLEX at: SIMCLEX.com The screen goes black at question 75. You're certain you failed. You cry in the parking lot, you google "shut off at 75 did I fail" forty times, you grieve for 48 hours — and then: PASS. This story happens to thousands of nursing grads every cycle, and this episode explains why. Jon Haws RN breaks down how the NCLEX's adaptive algorithm is designed to make EVERYONE feel like they're drowning, why the better you're doing the harder your test feels, why a minimum-question shut-off is a neutral signal, and the parking-lot protocol for protecting your next 48 hours. Feeling dumb in there is often literally the sensation of passing. Make the shut-off boring before test day: start a SIMCLEX free — first 15 questions on us at SIMCLEX.com. Keywords: NCLEX shut off at 75, did I fail the NCLEX, NCLEX shut off at 85 did I pass, computer adaptive test NCLEX, NCLEX good pop up, NCLEX anxiety. #nclex #nclexprep #nclexrn #shutoffat75 #nclexanxiety #newgradnurse #nursingstudent #nclex2026 #testanxiety #nextgennclex #nursetok #futurenurse #nclexstudying

Pass Any Nursing School Exam With Ease [2026 Update] 05.08.2026 9min

TRY NURSING.com FOR FREE AT: https://nursing.com The most-requested episode in the history of this podcast — completely re-recorded and updated for 2026, with a FREE printable study template. Jon Haws RN breaks down the 5-step system for passing any nursing school exam: studying the test before the content, turning objectives into questions, retrieval over re-reading (highlighting is banned), the 3-2-1 spacing method, and rehearsing real test conditions — the step that separates knowing it from proving it under pressure. Plus the worst exam of Jon's life and what it taught him about why hard-working students fail. Free template in the show notes. Prepping for boards? Start a SIMCLEX free — first 15 questions on us at SIMCLEX.com. Keywords: how to study for nursing school exams, nursing school study tips, study less score higher nursing, nursing exam study plan, retrieval practice nursing school. #nursingschool #nursingstudent #studytips #nursingschooltips #studentnurse #futurenurse #nursingexams #studygram #studytok #nclexprep #nursingschoolhacks #medsurg #rnstudent #nursetok

My Instructor Failed Me By One Point. On Purpose. 03.08.2026 11min

Try SIMCLEX for FREE at: SIMCLEX.com A 79.4. Passing was an 80. "I don't round." If you've ever felt like a nursing instructor was looking for a reason to fail you, this episode is for you — no instructor-bashing, just the truth about why subjective clinical grading keeps hurting good students, and the exact 5-move playbook to protect yourself: documentation habits, email trails, appeal deadlines, and how to fight with a rubric instead of emotions. Jon Haws RN shares his own story of being the student who stopped raising his hand — and the message from a 34-year-old career changer that inspired this episode. You belong here. From NURSING.com — tools built for the students the system isn't serving. Keywords: nursing instructor unfair grading, nursing school grade appeal, clinical evaluation unfair, failing nursing school by one point, toxic nursing instructors. #nursingschool #nursingstudent #nursingschoolproblems #futurenurse #studentnurse #nursesoftiktok #nursetok #nursingschoolstruggles #clinicals #nursingclinicals #gradeappeal #nursingschooladvice #rnstudent #nclex

The 30-Day NCLEX Plan for People Who Are Working Full Time 22.07.2026 11min

Take Free SIMCLEX HERE If you're working full-time, raising kids, or both, this episode is your entire NCLEX prep roadmap: 30 days, about 2 hours a day, built for people with real jobs and real lives. Jon Haws, RN, CCRN walks through the complete 4-phase system, day by day: PHASE 1 — Days 1–3: DIAGNOSE. Take a full-length adaptive diagnostic under real test conditions (not a static quiz), audit your results by client-need category, identify your bottom 3 weak areas, and build your 30-day calendar around YOUR shifts — including why night shifters should never study after a twelve. PHASE 2 — Days 4–19: BUILD. The exact daily 2-hour session structure: 30 minutes of content review on ONE topic, 60 minutes of targeted practice questions, 30 minutes of rationale review (including the rationales for answers you got RIGHT). Plus the weekly rhythm — 5 build days, 1 light day, 1 true rest day — and the Day 12 midpoint simulation that tells you whether your plan is working or your study source needs to change. PHASE 3 — Days 20–26: SIMULATE. Shift from content to conditions. Two full-length adaptive simulations, your 3-miss reset ritual, pacing practice, and how to make the dreaded shut-off boring before test day. PHASE 4 — Days 27–30: TAPER. Light review only, no new content, a full day completely off, and the test-day mindset that changes everything: hard questions mean the algorithm thinks you're good — feeling dumb in there is literally the sensation of passing. By Day 30 you'll have completed 4 full adaptive simulations, 16 targeted build sessions, and ~800 focused questions — on 2 hours a day, around a full-time job. Step zero of the plan is free: start a SIMCLEX at SIMCLEX.com — the first 15 questions are on us. It's the most realistic NCLEX simulation there is, with a true adaptive engine and every Next Gen item type. Full day-by-day calendar download in the show notes. Keywords: 30 day NCLEX study plan, NCLEX study schedule working full time, NCLEX prep 2 hours a day, NCLEX study plan while working, computer adaptive NCLEX practice, Next Gen NCLEX simulation, free NCLEX practice questions

Why 'Just Do More Questions' Is the Worst NCLEX Advice in Nursing School 20.07.2026 9min

SIMCLEX.com (start free — first 15 questions free) "Just do more questions" — the advice every nursing student gets and the reason so many walk into the NCLEX unprepared for what it actually is. Jon Haws RN breaks down computer-adaptive testing, why you can miss 45% of questions and still pass, why static question banks train the wrong skill, and how to rehearse the shut-off before test day. Start a SIMCLEX free — first 15 questions on us at SIMCLEX.com. Keywords: NCLEX study tips, computer adaptive test NCLEX, NCLEX question banks, how NCLEX scoring works, Next Gen NCLEX.

I Failed the NCLEX. Nobody Tells You What Happens Next 16.07.2026 10min

SIMCLEX.com (start free — first 15 questions free) Failed the NCLEX? Nobody tells you what happens next — not your school, not your program, nobody. Jon Haws RN walks through the exact 45-day retake roadmap: reading your Candidate Performance Report, why most retakes fail on format (not content), and how repeat test-takers turn a fail into a pass. Start a SIMCLEX free — first 15 questions on us at SIMCLEX.com. Keywords: failed NCLEX, NCLEX retake, candidate performance report, NCLEX fail what next, computer adaptive test, NCLEX simulation.

You Can't Memorize Nursing Pharmacology. Stop Trying. 24.06.2026 6min

Test your pharm knowledge at: SIMCLEX.com If pharmacology is the thing that's breaking you right now, I want to start with the most freeing sentence you'll hear all week: you cannot memorize pharmacology, and you need to stop trying. I mean it. There are thousands of medications. Nobody — not your sharpest classmate, not your instructor, not a working nurse with twenty years on the floor — has them all memorized as individual facts. So if your study plan is "make flashcards for every drug and its dose and its side effects and its contraindications," I need you to hear that the plan itself is broken. It's not that you're failing pharm. It's that you're playing a game that can't be won the way you're playing it. Here's the shift that changes everything. You don't learn drugs. You learn classes. The whole secret of pharmacology is that medications travel in families, and the family tells you most of what you need to know. If you understand what a beta blocker does, you understand the whole "-olol" family — how it works, what it does to heart rate and blood pressure, what to watch for, who shouldn't get it. You just turned forty flashcards into one concept. Do that across the major classes and the ocean suddenly has a shape. So here's how I'd actually study it. First, learn the mechanism — what does this class do in the body? If you understand the mechanism, the side effects aren't a separate list to memorize; they're just the logical consequences of the mechanism. A drug that lowers blood pressure — of course it can cause dizziness when you stand up. You didn't memorize that. You understood it. Second, learn the class by its stem. The naming isn't random. "-pril" is an ACE inhibitor. "-statin" lowers cholesterol. "-azepam" is in the benzo family. Those word parts are free points the test is practically handing you, if you've trained your eye to see them. Third — and this is the part most students skip — you test yourself with questions, not flashcards. Because here's the thing the NCLEX actually cares about: it does not ask you to recite a drug's half-life. It asks you what you'd do. What you'd assess, what you'd teach the patient, what you'd hold and call the provider about. That's applied knowledge, and the only way to build applied knowledge is to practice applying it — in questions, with rationales, over and over.

The Impostor in Your Head Is Lying to You 22.06.2026 6min

Get rid of the imposter at: SIMCLEX.com

Nursing School Wasn't Built for the Way You Learn 17.06.2026 7min

Take a SIMCLEX at: SIMCLEX.com I want to talk to the student who has started to believe something quietly devastating: that the reason nursing school is so hard for you is that something is wrong with you. Maybe you have ADHD. Maybe you're dyslexic. Maybe you process things more slowly, or anxiety hijacks you the second a test starts. And somewhere along the way you started to wonder if you're just not built for this. I want to flip that whole thing on its head. Nursing school wasn't built for the way you learn. That is not the same as you being incapable of learning nursing. Those are two completely different statements, and the difference between them might be the difference between you quitting and you becoming a nurse. Here's what I mean. The traditional nursing school model is built for one specific kind of brain — the one that can sit through a three-hour lecture, read fifty dense pages, hold it all in working memory, and reproduce it on a timed test. If that's not your brain, the system doesn't bend. It just makes you feel like you're failing. But notice what's actually happening there: the system is testing how well you fit its method, not how good a nurse you'll be. And those are not the same thing. Some of the most extraordinary nurses I've known are people who struggled badly in that lecture-hall model. So let's talk about what actually works when school wasn't built for you. If you have ADHD and a three-hour study block is a fantasy, stop pretending it isn't. Work in short, intense bursts with real breaks. Use questions to create the stimulation and feedback your brain craves, instead of fighting to stay awake over highlighted notes. If you're dyslexic and reading is slow and exhausting, stop making reading your primary input — lean on questions, audio, diagrams, and patterns. If you process more slowly, give yourself permission to go deep on fewer things instead of skimming everything badly. And if anxiety is the enemy, the antidote isn't "calm down" — it's evidence. Anxiety thrives on uncertainty, and the cure for uncertainty is data about where you actually stand. Notice the thread running through all of those. The fix is never "try to be a different kind of brain." The fix is "study in a way that gives your brain feedback and patterns instead of brute-force memorization." Feedback is the great equalizer. It doesn't care how you learn. It just tells you what you know and what you don't — and that works for every kind of mind.

Stop Waiting to Feel Ready 10.06.2026 6min

Go take the first step: SIMCLEX.com If you're waiting to feel ready before you take the next step, I want to lovingly tell you something: that feeling may not show up first. It may not show up at all the way you're picturing it. I see this constantly, and I've lived it. We tell ourselves, "I'll start when I feel ready. I'll schedule the test when I'm confident. I'll take the practice exam once I've reviewed just a little more." On the surface, that sounds responsible. It sounds careful. It sounds like preparation. Here's the problem. Waiting feels safe. More time, more notes, more videos, one more review pass — it all feels like getting ready. It scratches the itch of "I'm doing something." So we keep doing it, and the calendar keeps moving. But waiting can quietly become avoidance. And the dangerous part is the two look absolutely identical from the inside. Sometimes "I need more time" is true. And sometimes "I need more time" really means "I'm scared to find out where I stand." You have to be honest about which one it is — because one moves you forward and the other keeps you stuck while pretending to help.

The NCLEX Is a Terrible Place to Find Out You Weren't Ready. 08.06.2026 7min

Start a SIMCLEX now at: SIMCLEX.com The NCLEX is not the place where you want to discover that your prep wasn't working. Sit with that for a second, because it's the whole episode. There's a question hiding underneath all your studying that most students never ask directly. It's not "Did I study?" Of course you studied. The real question — the one that matters — is "Am I ready?" And those two things are not the same. First hard truth. More studying does not always mean more readiness. Activity and progress feel identical from the inside, but they're different animals. You can log a hundred hours and still walk in with blind spots you've never tested, because human nature is to keep practicing what you already know and quietly avoid what you don't. It feels like work. It even feels good. But it leaves the dangerous gaps untouched. That leads to the thing I worry about most: false confidence. You start recognizing the familiar question patterns. The comfortable topics feel comfortable. And comfort disguises itself as readiness. But the NCLEX isn't a familiar quiz you can settle into. It's adaptive. It pushes on you, raises the difficulty as you go, and probes right at the edge of what you know. Recognizing a question on a calm afternoon is not the same as being ready for that pressure.