{"id":62695,"date":"2012-02-08T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-02-08T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/uncategorized\/saving-lives-is-nursing-students-calling\/"},"modified":"2012-02-08T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2012-02-08T00:00:00","slug":"saving-lives-is-nursing-students-calling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/2012\/02\/saving-lives-is-nursing-students-calling\/","title":{"rendered":"Saving lives is nursing student\u2019s calling"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t\tSouth Kingstown resident spurns business degree to enter nursing field<\/p>\n

KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 February 8, 2012 \u2013 Helping keep people safe is something Garrett Lapisky has done since the age of 16. He just didn\u2019t think he\u2019d end up making a career out of it.<\/p>\n


\nAfter earning his nursing degree at the 溏心vlog免费B站 in December, the South Kingstown, R.I., native is one step closer to doing just that. <\/p>\n


\nLapisky, one of five male students in a winter graduating class of 63, took an unusual road to a career he seems almost destined to pursue.<\/p>\n


\nAfter graduating from South Kingstown High School in 2003, Lapisky enrolled at the Community College of Rhode Island to earn an associate\u2019s degree in business. He chose to study business or economics at 溏心vlog免费B站.<\/p>\n


\nBut as he took his classes, they left him feeling unfulfilled.<\/p>\n


\n\u201cI just realized it wasn\u2019t going to appeal to me,\u201d he said. \u201cI didn\u2019t want to wear a suit all day.\u201d<\/p>\n


\nLapisky has been a lifeguard since the age of 16 at South Kingstown Town Beach and has served as the lifeguard captain. He volunteered as an emergency medical technician in Charlestown and now volunteers for the Charlestown Fire District. <\/p>\n


\nHe enjoys taking care of people and is thrilled by the rush of responding to an emergency call.<\/p>\n


\nAs he pondered pursuing a different degree, Lapisky realized helping people was something he had always done and wanted to continue to do in his career. Switching majors was a difficult decision, particularly because he needed to take an extra year of classes to get the prerequisites he needed to enter the College of Nursing. But Lapisky just couldn\u2019t see himself living the 9-to-5 lifestyle.<\/p>\n


\n\u201cI put a lot of thought into it,\u201d Lapisky said. \u201cI went into nursing feeling like it was the right choice. It set me back a bit, but it was worth it.\u201d<\/p>\n


\nThe change was a bit jarring. He was often the only male in class and during clinicals, some patients objected to being treated by a male nurse.<\/p>\n


\n\u201cIt was a little shocking at first,\u201d Lapisky said. <\/p>\n


\nBut, he said, outside of the occasional uncomfortable patient, his gender quickly became a non-factor. <\/p>\n


\nThe real challenge, he said, was the demanding curriculum coupled with juggling a busy schedule that included plenty of midnight emergency calls.<\/p>\n


\nMany of the classes and clinicals he took were unlike anything Lapisky had ever studied or experienced before. He had never seen a baby born until he worked in a maternity ward.<\/p>\n


\nBut his training as an EMT gave him some experience in other areas.<\/p>\n


\n\u201cIt helped with some aspects,\u201d he said. \u201cWorking with patients in the trauma and cardiac care unit, that background helped. When I did my maternity semester, I had zero experience with that.\u201d<\/p>\n


\nLapisky seems to have found his calling in acute care and said he hopes to work in a Level I trauma center, such as Rhode Island Hospital, once he passes the national licensing exam for registered and practical nurses. He is scheduled to take the exam Feb. 22.<\/p>\n


\nIn time, he\u2019d like to become a flight nurse and work for a critical care helicopter service such as Life Star, based in Hartford, Conn.<\/p>\n


\n\u201cI like helping people, and the most opportunities to do that would be there,\u201d at a trauma center or critical care helicopter service, he said. \u201cIt\u2019s stressful, but it\u2019s the intensity level that I\u2019m drawn to. I think it\u2019s more rewarding stabilizing the patient right there and saving their life.\u201d<\/p>\n


\nFor more information about Lapisky, contact Brian Pernicone in the 溏心vlog免费B站 Department of Communications and Marketing at (401) 874-4894 or email him at bpernicone@advance.uri.edu.<\/p>\n


\n溏心vlog免费B站 Department of Communications & Marketing photo by Michael Salerno Photography.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Kingstown resident spurns business degree to enter nursing field KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 February 8, 2012 \u2013 Helping keep people safe is something Garrett Lapisky has done since the age of 16. He just didn\u2019t think he\u2019d end up making a career out of it. After earning his nursing degree at the University of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":62697,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62695"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62695\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62697"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}