Nursing is one of the most in demand jobs right now. In the USA, there is a huge gap between demand and supply – nursing is widely known as one of the most in-demand positions in America, due to a mixture of being challenging, hard-work and emotionally draining.
Being a nurse is not for the faint-hearted, as they have to deal with life and death on a daily basis, but what is it really like to have one of the most demanding and in-demand jobs in the country?
Demanding Shifts with No Consistency
Hospitals tend to allow nurses to determine when they work their shifts, but often they have to complete a set number of gruelling 12-hour shifts every week. However, overtime is not uncommon, and as well as set shifts, support shifts are required a couple of times a month too. At a hospital, every day is different and requires different tasks – nurses have to consider a huge number of responsibilities and attempt to prioritize them accordingly. This can put a fair amount of pressure on nurses and it can be difficult to not feel responsible for something going wrong during a task that wasn’t a top priority.
Career Progression
There are many different tiers of nurses and before nurses progress up their career ladder, they first have to complete several prerequisites. These rely on education, famously many need to complete lpn to rn online accredited programs, which aim to transition the nurse into one that’s more qualified to understand pharmacology, adult health nursing, as well as women’s health and more. There are lots of different career paths open to nurses – with seemingly endless specialties available – from GI and critical care to being a midwife or caring for those with diabetes.
The hiring process is also different – as with many companies each hospital has a slightly different hiring process, but nurses usually need to train at a hospital before they become a qualified medical professional, and can gain a huge advantage if they leave a good impression at the hospital at which they trained.
Integrity and Resilience are crucial
Due to the extremely stressful nature of illness, nurses need to use several interpersonal skills on a minute-by-minute basis. They need to be kind, caring, prosocial but also act with integrity and resilience at all times. Nurses can’t take short-cuts – the effects would be catastrophic, but they also need to possess the ability to handle stress without succumbing to anger or getting upset. It can be tough dealing with unhappy patients that might be angry with slow service, but emotional intelligence is part of their job description.
The biggest misconception about nurses (though more and more people are becoming aware of it) is that most people don’t realise that they are incredibly time pressured almost all of the time. Combine that with the ability to contribute to saving a life and you have a profession that’s incredibly stressful but also hugely rewarding.
