Nursing and healthcare jobs are some of the most in-demand jobs in the United States at this time. There are always openings for skilled nurses and other healthcare workers, and you can pick and choose where you want to work in most cases as well. Nursing is one of the most important job roles within the medical reality, and good nurses are needed in clinics, at hospitals, and in specialty care facilities.
Many people are not aware that there are so many different kinds of nursing roles one can apply for with the right training and education. Nurses might also work in many different sides of nursing during their career. Knowing the different kinds of nursing and what their role is in the healthcare reality can make it easier to find the nursing job of your dreams.
If you have been wondering about the different types of nurses and their role in healthcare, you need to read on!
Different Types of Nurses and their Role in Healthcare
1. Registered Nurse
Also known as certified registered nurse anesthetist, these nurses have the job role that everyone thinks of when a nurse is mentioned. This group of nurses provides care in clinical as well as hospital settings, and they do all the work to gather patient information at admission. They might provide medication and limited care, or they could be part of the full-time staff at a care facility.
There are many different places that an RN can work and different levels of patient interaction that are required in each. You might spend all day with patients at some facilities, while at others, you might see patients for part of each day and then work on other tasks. This is the kind of job that many nurses start out in, but some people choose to remain an RN for their whole career.
2. Licensed Practical Nurse LPN
A Licensed Nurse Practitioner can provide the same services as doctors. They are able to formulate treatment plans, provide diagnoses, and have their own patients that they see for all kinds of complaints and treatments. A lot of LPNs work in family medicine, but LPNs might also provide home care, or they could choose specialty focuses such as OB GYN.
An LPN will not have to go to the same amount of school as a doctor, but they can treat patients in most of the same ways. This is a critical part of the nursing community, and being able to provide the kind of care that doctors can provide improves the earning potential of this career path as well. For nurses who want to be involved with their patients’ care and treatment plans over the long haul, this is a great choice for a job.
3. Certified Nurse Assistant
This is a specialty segment of nursing, and Certified Nursing Assistants help RNs and LPNs with a variety of tasks. These nurses might work to help provide acute care in the ICU, or they could be tasked with monitoring people in recovery from major surgery. CNAs can also offer most of the treatment that LPNs can, but they cannot provide plans of care or suggest treatment plans to patients.
The Certified Nurse Assistant offers key support for fragile patients and for those with complex treatment needs. They are more experienced overall than an RN might be, and they have special training that can make them highly valuable in skilled care areas. This is a really great choice to make within the nursing field if you are good with details and want to provide focused care to patients. This is also an exciting part of the nursing field and one that will often place you in the emergency room environments or high-pressure care units.
4. Nurse Practitioner
If you have always wanted to be a doctor, but you love the nursing side of the world, this is the right choice to make. As a nurse practitioner, you can provide treatment plans, diagnoses, and care at all levels for your patients. Many Nurse Practitioners will choose an area of focus like OB GYN or family medicine, and they will have their own list of patients just like the doctors that they might be working alongside.
Being an NP requires more school, and you will need at least a Master’s Degree in your field of medicine. You will need to maintain a license, and there is a requirement for hands-on experience outside of the NP role as well. This is an essential part of the healthcare reality because the Nurse Practitioner provides care that is influenced by a perspective born of nursing experience. Being able to work alongside doctors to collaborate on patient care or managing their own patients allows the NP to have a wide range of functionality within the medical community.
Nursing is a Key Part of the Medical Community
Nurses provide key support in various roles within the medical community. Patient care depends on nurses in hospitals and clinics, and LPNs and NPs provide the same care as doctors in their own practice locations or even in hospitals or specialty care units. Nursing is a vital part of the medical reality, and those with a nursing degree will have a wide array of job opportunities open to them no matter what their area of focus or prior experience.
Whether nurses are working in a clinic, a hospital, or a specialty care facility, they are almost always the staff that is at the frontline of care. Nurses interact with patients the most out of any other treatment provider, and they are the face that many patients expect to see. Being the primary treatment provider in all kinds of patient care locations makes nurses absolutely essential to the medical industry as a whole.
If you have been thinking about becoming a nurse, these nursing jobs are only a few of the many excellent options that exist in the medical industry. You can make a big difference in people’s lives when you become a nurse, and you will never regret taking this step for your future.
