Nursing Career

No matter the direction in which the world evolves, it will always need nurses. Nursing is one of the best and rewarding careers involving the provision of basic and specialized care to patients. In the process, nursing informatics develops, and it acts as a liaison between nursing and the technical world. It is considered a caring, profession, an art, and vocation. World Health Organization defines nursing services as part of total health which aims at promoting health care and providing prevention of disease.

The first step to nursing is learning about the nursing profession. It entails the duties and responsibilities which they are accountable for after the training period. Some of their duties include treating the sick to alleviate the level of suffering, educating the family on the care to be shown to the sick, keeping records on the patient medical histories and administering of treatments and medication. One should also have an idea of the fields where nurses work (job prospects) and possible advanced careers in nursing. Nursing is one of the profession where the trainees have a broad job market. The highest percentage of nurses usually work in hospitals while others can engage themselves in community health, ambulatory care, nursing homes and nursing education. Some of the specialization fields include nursing practitioner, certified course midwife, clinical nurse specialist and in certified registered nurse anesthetists.

 Nursing can drive one in different directions like from a staff to the head nurse (Price,2009). It is critical to consider the working environment in formulating a career path. For instance, most registered nurses are found in a hospital setting while nursing assistants are in nursing homes. Therefore,  one should take into consideration the type of environment which inspires him/her most

Choosing the school that fits one and joining the school for starting the programme is the next step. The career path one is interested in dictates the type of nursing degree one needs. Nursing programmes have the theoretical bit and practical one (clinical experience). The practical experience helps one to acquire and gain hands-on skills ask the most disturbing questions in real life situations and connect with nurses all over the world. The experience will enable one to observe and learn how medical facilities work and operated. This point is also crucial in deciding which degree to pursue; one can choose either to take bachelor’s degree or associates degree (Price 2009). An associate degree may be the best for those not intending to study for long and spend much in school, and they are offered in community colleges. However, bachelor’s degree would be good for advancement. Also one should take into consideration the studying mode. Do you prefer studying online or living on the campus as studying? For the second degree student, commuting might be the best if you don’t want to revisit the first experience you acquired on your first degree.

One should also decide on the nursing specialization. It is vital for an individual to acquire exposure on each during t,he training period to entirely make up their minds on what to pursue. Some of the specialties include; adult health which encompasses oncology to OR nursing. The benefits of adult health are that it builds a good foundation in nursing and the skills acquired can be applied to other fields. Pediatrics is involved taking care of children, in critical care, it encompasses skills needed in ICU and ER. Maternal health deals with women’s health, community health enhances promotion health promotion, and psychiatric health cares for the mentally ill.

The trainee should pass The National Council Licensure Examination (NCLEX) to get licensed. It’s a must for each nurse to pass this exam for one to become a registered nurse.one should formulate the best studying tactics to pass in this exams. One of the common themes in NCLEX is prioritization (Melnyk et al. 2014). In the question one is given a list of scenarios and the student should decide on which to attend first. These questions come along with a mnemonic ABC which represents Air, Breathing Circulation. On interpreting this, the airway is the most essential in an emergency case so the nurse should make sure no blockages in the airway. The next step is to make sure that the patient is breathing and finally, the circulation is established through pulse test. Most NCLEX questions test the concept involving this knowledge. Students should also have confidence in themselves that they will pass if they have been consistently getting average grades.

            Once licensed, the trainee should think about the possibility of the first job. The nurse should try getting a preceptor who will coach him/her becoming familiar and oriented to the facilities routine, people and procedures and all other healthcare consultancies. Finally one has to prepare for the first year as a nurse.

In conclusion, every competent nurse must have followed the given steps in his/her lifetime in nursing. The title has also confirmed that nursing is one of the fields in which people face ethical dilemmas and choices and while it possesses unique features, it has a lot in common with one’s moral experience.

REFERENCES

Melnyk, B. M., Gallagher‐Ford, L., Long, L. E., & Fineout‐Overholt, E. (2014). The establishment of evidence‐based practice competencies for practicing registered nurses and advanced practice nurses in real‐world clinical settings: proficiencies to improve healthcare quality, reliability, patient outcomes, and costs. Worldviews on Evidence‐Based Nursing, 11(1), 5-15

Price, S. L. (2009). Becoming a nurse: a meta‐study of early professional socialization and career choice in nursing. Journal of advanced nursing, 65(1), 11-19