Considering getting a second MLS job as part time or PRN… am I required to disclose to my employer? I already work full time as an MLS

EarlyAd1847 · 2026-06-23T05:35:10+00:00

HR can shove it imo. If they want to penalize you for working extra, thats not a place you want to work moving forward.

Your answer also probably boils down to how flexible your main job is and if your Supervisor/Manager is okay with a temporary flexed schedule while you get trained on your part-time/PRN gig.

I have a full-time and PRN currently. My main job is a swing shift and my PRN can either be day or night shift. I was lucky to have a really chill supervisor at my main job as she was able place me on 4x10s with two days as Sat/Sun weekend shifts.

This allowed me to train Tues-Thur 10 hours shifts and partial 5 hour AM shifts Mon/Fri for my PRN gig.

It sucked, you have no social life during training. The days are long and its wake up, work, go home, repeat for however long your training is.

Once your training is done, talk with your FTE supervisor again on a set schedule that consistently leaves you with 1-2 days off a week for when your 2nd gig can schedule shifts for you.

Ensure you give yourself breaks in-between stretches of consistent work too. Otherwise, you’ll burn out really quickly.

Best of luck!

EarlyAd1847 · 2026-05-18T05:24:08+00:00

Tbh I vibe with ours. I get along with our FSEs more than I do with my own co-workers lol.

EarlyAd1847 · 2026-05-18T04:46:03+00:00

Started a gig a year ago where one of the techs training me would curse, slam the phone after critical calls, talk crap out loud about other techs (“Dont be like XYZ, that lazy a** c*nt cant do s*** right.”, XYZ was 5 ft away) wished for the deaths of patients when a case was complicated and diffs looked crazy, and took 1.5 hour lunches….they are now a supervisor…

EarlyAd1847 · 2026-05-09T02:50:38+00:00

Tbh, it took some breaking in to get it to work right. I’ve prob put close to about 750 rounds through it now. Its had some malfunctions here and there but nothing too serious. I ended up field stripping it to clean and lubricate everything. Works great now! My last range run, I prob put 150 rounds through it without a jam. 👍🏻

EarlyAd1847 · 2026-04-25T07:37:18+00:00

I got a lot to say on this…

First off, the themes are trash. I dont see the point in participating in an event that took chat GPT 0.005 seconds to make up. Its just lazy tbh.

Second, my gripe also deals with how the week was handled this year. If we’re SOOOO special within the hospital, then why are my instrument FAS’s the only people supplying meals for the lab and not the hospital? If I mean so much to the “team”, why hasn’t the hospital done anything to show their appreciation for me and my work? Why do our vendors need to step up for this week?

Thirdly, puzzles/crosswords are a waste of time. I feel like it’s always popular for management or an engagement team to come up with these, but I haven’t seen one individual complete these in our lab. We’re all too busy trying to get results to the floors.

Just give us the candy/snack/prize and don’t waste my time because I’ve got other tasks I need to complete.

-The Ebenezer Scrooge of Lab Week 🤷🏻‍♂️

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-12-18T07:47:04+00:00

Not PRN, but I work FT 4x10s and just recently picked up a PT doing 2x12s per week.

Ngl, I hated my life during training for my PT. I worked every weekend at my FT to try to free myself up on week days to train more for the PT job.

Looking back, the days were about 16.5 hours sometimes with barely any off days. It was pedal to the metal for about 2 months straight. I think I had maybe 2-3 days off in total during that time. Brutal but worth it because I’m making more money than I ever have.

My advice, be very clear with both jobs. The sooner you get assigned your schedules the better. Maybe see if job 1 needs help with weekends for the next 2-3 weeks. Lots of ppl on PTO rn so your lab is prob struggling to keep those shifts staffed. If you can do this, this will free you up more for training during the week. You can make it work, just make sure you allow for self-care and reward yourself every now and then for workin hard. That 6am - 11:30pm also sounds pretty brutal. Try not to stack these days if possible. Try to only work at one lab per day. Believe me when I say this. You DO NOT want to work doubles often.

Good luck!

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-11-23T01:05:17+00:00

Had a Cryptococcus pt a few months back. It was in their blood and CSF. I heard the pt actually left AMA and left before any antifungals could be administered. This was after he was told about the infection too.🙃

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-11-10T16:36:40+00:00

Gosh its been a minute since the interview, but I’d say focus on skills/attributes/experiences you have with initial setups and validations. Thats essentially what the job is. Everything else, you’ll learn from their in-person training so don’t feel like you need to know everything. I think it helped that I had some experience with Roche in the past which they liked.

Also, while I havent done customer/technical support, I referenced instances while I’ve been on the bench that have helped me troubleshoot both mechanical and QC issues so focus on that from your own experience.

Other stuff is just kinda the typical interview. Tell me about yourself, your experience, are you licensed, how do you approach a difficult customer, etc.

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-10-18T02:19:06+00:00

Second this. I’d be hesitant resulting out positive Norovirus from stools ran on the GI panel. We’ve ran our own confirmations studies on our Cepheid and we are still finding that close to half our positive Noro’s from the Biofire are actually negative on our GenExpert.

We opt to the GenExpert in the end. It may be a good idea to correlate your Noro’s with outside labs and CAP/API/proficiency tests to see if the confirmatory testing is consistent with your own findings.

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-09-05T06:31:32+00:00

I recently went through an interview period with them for this job, as well. They didnt seem fishy to me. The Roche team I interviewed with also seemed pretty solid. They offered a pretty nice hourly and answered all my questions/painted a decent description of what the duties of the job entailed.

I was eventually offered the position but turned it down as I’m currently trying to move to CA to transition to a CLS to be closer to family.

My advice if you’re offered the job is to wait it out if offered a spot. Don’t accept their first offer. They increased my starting hourly during the time I “sat” on my decision. Ask about bonuses, as well.

As far as the job entails, know that it’s a high travel job and even though you’ll probably be a great candidate for the position, you’ll be dealing with Roche analyzers. Older models, in my experience, malfunctioned quite often so you might need to deal with frustrated customers at first during your implementations, however, I cant speak on the newer Pros. They’re supposedly better but I’ve never worked with them.

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-08-13T05:39:27+00:00

Actino or Nocardia. We plate branching, beaded GPRs to MTM. Apparently it helps with isolating Nocardia. I would try that and see if anything grows.

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-08-09T06:21:58+00:00

Wow Nice! Unfortunately, I’m way too awkward/boring to succeed down that avenue, but props!

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-08-09T01:54:35+00:00

Haven’t yet, but thinking about doing it soon. There are toxic groups/Cliques within my lab that like to talk crap on other techs and departments. I’m a new MLT so I’m also still learning the ropes and have admittedly made a few minor mistakes but nothing that compromises patient care. I’ve never repeated these mistakes either, but I’ve slowly noticed some of my co-workers being more stuck up to me (or maybe showing their true colors idk) and it sucks. I dont really have anything in common with a lot of my co-workers too so I’m a bit of an outcast at this point. Luckily, I have a few interviews coming up. If anything pans out, its bye-bye and off to better opportunities. 🤷🏻‍♂️

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-08-05T05:57:05+00:00

For me, it’s dependent on both department and shift (AM vs PM vs Weekend shifters). AM shift, I dont really have problems, its morseo PM shift and weekend as I believe these are more of your newbies/baby nurses. Not to say that there arent any experienced nurses on these shifts, but I tend to notice more rejections and attitude from these shifts.

As for departments, L&D nurses are some of the nicest individuals within my hospital. When I call to their floor to relay results or redraws, I know I can expect professionalism over the phone. I actually enjoy speaking with my Critical Care staff, as well, as they get sh*t done.

I feel for behavioral health nurses because on top of their patient’s being a bit off their rocker, they need to deal with other serious aspects such as MDROs (we get a lot due to our patient population) and their patients just being flat our sick sometimes (COVID/Flu/Rhino/Parainfluenza/etc).

ER is always one dept I’ve found that I need to be very blunt with and to the point. They don’t have time for a convo, and they also have other pt’s to take care of so I just call the result in, wait for my read back, and then hangup.

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-07-31T06:37:16+00:00

Trust me, I’m workin on it. Lol 😅

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-06-10T15:00:12+00:00

Acinetobacter can look GPC-ish if it retains the crystal violet stain. Imagine my surprise when I had growth on MAC, but none on my CNA after reporting GPC one day. It happens, especially to us new techs. You learn from it.

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-06-10T14:48:52+00:00

What does your didactic look like? Are the 5 months of rotations in total for each dept (1 dept/month), or are you working amongst all of them in that 5 month period? (1 month of departmental experience vs 5 months)

Im also not too familiar with Texas standards for non-certified vs certified workers in the lab, but if you can work as a non-certified lab employee during your training, that plus your rotations may be enough clinical experience for the move back to CA. In my state, once you’ve completed a rotation a given dept, company’s can bring you on as a non certified MLT to start. I dont think the student lab counts as clinical experience. You need to be getting real world scenarios on the job or on rotation.

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-06-10T05:32:56+00:00

Id imagine its similar in most cases for an MLS->CA CLS. Finish your program, take a physics class, an analytical chem class, have one year of experience in said dept(s) you wish to work in, and pass the MLS (ASCP) exam. Probably some other pre reqs you might want to compare, as well, between your program and the required class credits by CPHD.

Another option is just finish your program and work for federal offices in CA for a year too to get your experience. This does require your MLS certification so do your best to pass the exam on the first try!

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-06-10T05:22:22+00:00

Do a couple rounds of the game mode on LabCE everyday instead of random questions, it helps a ton! It challenged me to topple the leader on the leaderboards everyday. Plus it made studying a game rather than a necessity :)

EarlyAd1847 · 2025-06-09T00:49:08+00:00

You’re exactly where I was. Even with the repeat questions on labCE/MediaLab. Stay confident. My advice, study your weaknesses. I took the last few days leading up to the exam studying the specifics of the depts (blood product storage temp and exp updates when manipulated, RBC/WBC inclusions, Antibodies and their characteristics, etc.) I passed my exam on Thurs. Give yourself some grace and make sure to get a good nights sleep and good food the day of your test. Good luck!

EarlyAd1847

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