Deciding to pursue a career in the health care field is a noble and rewarding choice. The field of nursing is constantly in need of highly trained professionals, meaning that by choosing nursing as a career you will always have an employment opportunity just around the corner. The University of Phoenix offers a variety of nursing programs which will allow practitioners in the health care field to further their education and open new doors. Available through on campus learning and online programs, a University of Phoenix Nursing Degree is your next step to achieving your goals.

University of Phoenix Nursing Degree

For more than 30 years the University of Phoenix has been at the forefront of secondary education, offering comprehensive programs that are geared to enable those already in the workforce to further their education and gain new opportunities. With emphasis offered in several areas, University of Phoenix Nursing Degree programs will provide you with the knowledge and skills to be a leader in the health care field. Some of the areas of emphasis with the University of Phoenix Nursing Degree programs include:

• Bachelor of Science in Nursing
• Bachelor of Science in Health Administration
• Master of Health Administration
• Master of Health Administration – Gerontology
• Master of Science in Nursing
• Master of Health Administration – Education

These programs will provide you with the foundation you need to be a health care practitioner, educator hospital administrator. No matter what your dream job in the health care field is, The University of Phoenix Nursing Degree program can help you achieve it.

University of Phoenix Locations

The University of Phoenix is dedicated to helping people achieve their goals of higher education. They understand that their students live busy lives and for that reason they offer programs that are tailored to meet the needs of students at over 200 campuses and nursing schools throughout the United States and Canada which allow students to get the education they deserve while remaining close to home.

• Chicago, IL
• Madison, WI
• Puerto Rico
• Richmond, VA
• San Diego, CA
• Cheyenne, WY
• Calgary, AB
• Vancouver, BC

And many more! The University of Phoenix Nursing Degree is also offered online. This allows students to learn at their own pace while still getting the comprehensive, quality education that only the University of Phoenix can provide. To learn more about University of Phoenix nursing Degree programs and which campus is closest to you just follow the link and take the first step to your higher education.

Lincoln Technical Institute: Are you thinking of pursuing a degree in nursing?

If you can handle a physically and emotionally challenging career that comes with the extraordinary satisfaction of truly helping people, it just might be the career for you. Nursing focuses on assisting people who are in need of health care. There are hundreds of specialties in nursing that range from pediatric to geriatric and holistic to tradition medicine. The main goal of a nurse, no matter what their specialty, is to help patients attain and keep optimum health. Falling somewhere between a difficult profession and a cause with purpose, nursing promotes quality of living – and Lincon Technical Institute’s Nursing Program is designed to teach its students what they need to be some of the best in their vocation.

Nursing is one of the most diverse professions, appearing in some shape or form in every culture on the globe. Nurses often handle every type of bodily fluid imaginable and have to deal with many emotionally and physically trying events on a regular basis. But, the fundamental purpose that drives nursing is the ambition to care for people. In fact, many practitioners state that nursing is an art that combines caring for people with today’s modern health care technology and sciences.

Lincon Technical Institute Nursing Program

If nursing sounds like the career for you and you live near…

• Hamden, CT
• New Britain, CT
• Shelton, CT
• Edison, NJ
• Mount Laurel, NJ
• Paramus, NJ

… Lincon Technical Institute has nursing schools and nursing program in your area.

Lincoln Technical Institute’s Nursing program is taught by experienced, certified nursing instructors and offers a comprehensive curriculum in practical nursing. This includes clinical rotations in:

• Geriatrics Child Development
• Maternity
• Extended care
• Medical terminology
• Human Biology

Graduates of Lincoln Technical Institute’s Nursing program could be prepared to take the Practical Nursing Licensing Exam, which when passed will open a multitude of career opportunities for you.

Lincoln Technical Institute Locations

Since 1946 Lincon Technical Institute has been one of the leading career-training and educational institutions in the United States. Since its conception, Lincoln Technical Institute has opened schools in states including New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, West Palm Beach, Illinois, Indiana and Colorado in addition to its first established schools in Georgia and Nevada. With 34 campuses across the nation, the institute’s ambition is to help students pursue their career paths through hands-on learning and dedicated instructors.

Lincon Technical Institute offers Associate’s as well as Bachelor’s degrees in a multitude of programs including Culinary Arts, Spa Management, Skilled Trades, Automotive, Information Technology and Business, and Health Sciences. Lincoln Technical institute has trained hundreds of thousands of professionals in these fields for over 60 years. The institution is especially adept in helping non-traditional students and working with the unique challenges that today’s adult student population faces, which is the reason it offers:

• Flexible class schedules
• Career placement assistance
• Financial assistance
• Online classes in an array of programs

In the early 1980’s, people in states such as Texas, California, Arizona, and Florida began to see the opportunity to open traveling nursing agencies to fill the demand for nurses in states that have higher populations in the winter months. With higher populations came more illnesses. The increase in illness raised the demand for nursing staff. The success of traveling nurse careers promoted the opening of agencies in states throughout the nation as a solution for the overwhelming shortages in healthcare.

What is a Traveling Nurse?

Traveling nurses are those in the profession who take on positions for short-term assignments usually lasting between 8 and 26 weeks. If a nurse is looking for temporary positions, but not wanting to relocate, many agencies have contracts for day-to-day work to fill staffing shortages. These nurses are found through agencies that specialize in traveling nurse careers. In addition to salary and benefits, these agencies find available positions, provide housing, and assist with living expenses. A traveling nurse fills a temporary position in a healthcare facility and is paid higher wages than one who is on staff. This gives the nurse the prospect to relocate if that is what is desired. Some facilities recruit the nurse if they are pleased with how he/she carries out his/her duties, but that is an option.

Traveling Nurse Careers Salary

The salary one should expect in traveling nurse careers varies due to experience and location. The average hourly rate for a traveling nurse ranges between $24 and $40+, not forgetting the highlights of assisting with housing and living expenses. The higher the cost of living in a location raises the amount the nurse is paid. Nurses who specialize in a particular area also have the opportunity of a higher pay rate, just as they would if they were on staff, compared to nurses without a specialty.

Job Outlook for Traveling Nurse Career

The job outlook for traveling nurse careeris great and in high demand, as with any nursing career. Healthcare facilities, whether hospitals, nursing homes, or doctors offices, on average use about 25% of their staffing budget for hiring traveling nurses to fill staff. Unlike other careers clusters, the failing economy will not affect traveling nurses. Healthcare is always going to be in demand and a nurse is always on the frontline.

RNs make up the largest portion of jobs in healthcare. About sixty percent of the over two and a half million jobs are in a hospital setting. Others work in skilled nursing facilities usually with a role of manager or supervisor, in home health care, or doctors’ offices. There are other job opportunities for Registered Nurses such as occupational health, addition recovery services, hospice care, and holistic medicine.

RN Specialization

Working in a hospital gives a RN the chance to specialize in a particular field of medicine just as a doctor would. These opportunities include, but are not limited to:

• Emergency or trauma, transplant
• Rehabilitation, radiology
• Psychiatric-mental health
• Perianesthesia
• Critical care
• Ambulatory care

Focusing in the care of a specific disease, genetic disorder, or illness is an option for an RN:

• HIV/AIDS and cancer
• Disabled populations, such as physical, mental, or emotional
• Wound nurses treat patients with openings due to traumatic injury, bedsores, diabetes, amputations, etc.

RNs also specialize in specific physiological areas and the diseases and illnesses associated with them.:

• Urology
• Cardiovascular
• Dermatology
• Gastroenterology
• Gynecology
• Nephrology
• Neuroscience
• Ophthalmic
• Orthopedic
• Otorhinolaryngology
• Respiratory

Another form of specialization a nurse might find interesting is by age population:

• Neonatology – newborns
• Pediatrics – children and adolescents.
• Gerontology and geriatrics – adults and the elderly.

RN Settings

RNs who specialize may work in hospitals, rehabs, and/or doctors offices. Some registered nurses who chose not to work in typical healthcare settings work in places such as correctional facilities, camps, military, resorts, ships, and schools.

RN Education

RNs have three different paths to acquire licensure:

• BSN (Bachelor of Science in Nursing) offered by four-year colleges
• ADN (Associate Degree in Nursing)
• Diploma from an approved nursing program

Most nurses obtain their RN from either the Associate or Bachelor Degree programs. The ADN takes two to three years to complete. A BSN usually takes four to five years to complete. There are accelerated programs (12 – 18 months) for those who have a bachelor’s degree in another field.

After completing the education from one of the thousands of nursing schools worldwide and clinical training requirements, students must pass a national licensing examination known as the NCLEX-RN. Additional training is often needed if a specialized nursing career is to be pursued.

RN Salaries

RN salaries usually ranges from $50,000 to $70,000 depending on experience, work environment, and specializations. Nurses who acquire a managerial position may have the opportunity earn a higher salary similar to the salary of nurses with years of experience.

RN Job Outlook

Job outlook for RNs is excellent overall. Location and environment determines the amount of employment opportunities a nurse may have. The U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics has determined that employment opportunities for RNs are anticipated to be the fastest growing occupation in the next ten years, including more than a half million jobs. These statistics do not account for the hundreds of thousands of jobs that will become available by those nurses retiring from their careers.

With the life expectancy of the elderly increasing, the number of senior citizens unable to care for themselves, or families not being able to provide the essential care at home, nursing homes and assisted living facilities are rapidly popping up all over. Hospitals and doctors offices are seeing an increase of patients due to the new studies, infections, and diseases being discovered every day. Nursing is one of the most demanded positions in the 21st century. Nurses will always be needed.

Licensed Practical Nurse (LPN)

LPNs work in all areas of the healthcare field: nursing homes, sub acute rehabilitations, hospitals and doctor’s offices. In long and short term nursing facilities LPNs pass medications, evaluate residents upon admission. During routine follow-ups, LPNs determine the patient’s needs and develop care plans. They also oversee nurse’s aides. LPNs in a doctor’s office duties include making appointments, taking vital signs when a patient arrives for an appointment, being responsible for keeping medical records up to date, and additional office duties. Some LPNs work as visiting nurses for those families who chose to keep their family member at home but cannot provide necessary care that a trained medical professional can. They visit patients at their home to take vital signs and look for any changes that would need to be reported to a doctor. LPNs also teach family members how to administer medicines, prepare foods if there is a specialty diet required, and perform care on the patient when there is not a caregiver a the home.

Education for an LPN would include a one-year program with a state approved training program. This would include classroom study and clinical education from one of the thousand of nursing schools worldwide. After finishing the program, students would be required to pass a licensing exam known as the NCLEX-PN.

LPN Salary Ranges from $28,000 to $50,000 and are determined by factors such as setting, region, and experience. LPN salaries prior experience as a Certified Nurse’s Assistant (CNA) or patient care associate in a hospital and/or skilled nursing facility can increase the starting salary and provide experience in the field giving that extra foot in the door when when searching for an LPN position.

Job Outlook for LPNs is high as in all phases of nursing. Over the next ten years it is predicted that job opportunities will increase by at least 15%. The majority of these will be in home healthcare settings and skilled nursing facilities. Due to the growing elderly population and hospitals discharging patients before they can thrive at home, the population of people entering a skilled nursing facility, whether for short term or long term care, continues to grow. This requires the need for more licensed professionals to care for them.

The history of nursing shows little evidence that any form of nursing, as we know it, existed beyond caring for family, helping as midwives, and as wet and dry nurses. As the need grew for assisting the poor and the sick, so did the need for nurses – mostly during times of war. Throughout the history of nursing, improvement of training and working conditions for the ill and the nurses has been a battle in itself.

History of Nursing: 15th – 18th Centuries

The history of modern nursing shows us the origins began in the 15th century with the Christian period as wet nurses employed to provide nourishment, in the position of servant, then as dry nurse. Thus the terms nursing and nursery evolved.

In times of war, nuns of the Catholic Church administered to wounds both spiritually and medically. In the 16th century, the Sisters of Charity administered to the poor in their own homes and the streets.

By the beginning of the 17th century, the need for increased and improved medical care brought the establishment of the first North American hospital in Montreal. Nuns were brought from France to administer to the sick. Along with them came teaching nuns who taught area Indians to nurse their people.

In the colonies at the start of the American Revolution there wasn’t time to organize a nursing corp. Nuns of the Catholic Church were again called upon to help care for the wounded and sick. Women who followed their husbands were often found on the battlefields nursing to soldiers under enemy fire as did the famous Molly Pitcher in the Battle of Monmouth (NJ).

History of Nursing: 19th Century

Florence Nightingale advanced nursing by bringing attention to the need of nursing as a career through her participation in the Crimean War calling attention to the deplorable conditions.

The history of nursing also tells us of others in the 19th century who brought nursing education and care reform. The Civil War brought attention to the serious need for trained nurses who could respond to the needs of the troops. Clara Barton, a prominent nursing figure during the American Civil War, also contributed much to the development of nursing and founded the US Red Cross.

An outcome from these historical events was the establishment of nursing schools in eastern United States cities during the second half of the 1800s. The first hospital nurse training program was provided by the New England Hospital for Women and Children with a one-year program in 1872.  New Haven, Boston, and New York followed with training schools. Early history of nurse training has shown that the programs had little education but helped in the running of the hospitals. Nurses were charged with the responsibility of cleaning patients, beds, equipment, laundry, and rooms while working long 14-hour days and 7-day workweeks with very little free time for meals or rest.

History of Nursing: 20th Century

The 20th century brought better standards for the nurses and their working environment – a concern throughout the history of nursing. Because of the poor training and working conditions, nursing organizations were formed to address these concerns and demand change.  It is because of nursing organizations that men were excluded from the Army Corps of Nurses formed in 1907. It wasn’t until the Korean War that men were allowed to serve as military nurses.

World War II brought cause to remove experienced nurses from hospitals and assign them to military hospitals, responsible for treatment decisions for the first time.  To make up for the shortage of nurses, a Cadet Nurse Corps program was initiated in 1943. Over 100,000 nurses received training through this program over the next three years. Nurses serving during World War II were introduced to specialty areas of medicine such as psychiatry and anesthesia.

History of Nursing

The history of nursing has brought nurses a long way from being servant wet nurses to their present day status of members of a highly regarded medical profession.  As technology and medical care specialties continue to grow, so does the history of nursing. The 21st century promises to bring more exciting developments in medical treatments and advanced technology.