How Nursing is Beneficial

The nursing profession has been around since the beginning of time and is still

evolving today. In the United States, nursing began approximately in the 1700s and

dealt with the tending to sick and elderly people. Their job description did not change

until the Civil War from taking care of the sick and elderly to taking care of men injured

while in the war. Nursing became a very popular profession in the United States after

World War II due to soldiers and war veterans needing to be taken care of. Then in the

1950s the nursing field started to grow when colleges started to offer Master's and

Doctorate programs. To further expand the field of nursing, in the 1990s specialized

nursing became more prevalent due to the fact that the nursing field is continuously

growing. These advancements over many years has helped create the modern day

nurses we now see (History of Nursing). Nursing is a challenging healthcare

profession that focuses on the care of families and individuals, whose goal is to help

them maintain excellent health.

Nursing is a very competitive position in the medical field. There are many paths

that can be taken to become a nurse but the two most common are either obtain an

Associates degree in nursing or to obtain their Bachelors degree in nursing. Nurses

can now obtain their Associates degree or Bachelors degree either on a college

campus or online but a Bachelors degree is preferred at most facilities. While

completing a Bachelors Degree, in nursing the first two years of nursing school consist

of taking psychology, human biology, microbiology, organic chemistry, nutrition and

anatomy. The final two years consist of taking community health nursing, maternal

health, pediatrics, adult acute chronic care, and psychiatric/mental health nursing. Also,
while in nursing school, a nurse will also learn other skills that are needed to succeed.

The other nursing classes that are taken will also cover information about leadership,

health informatics, and health policy. The last thing that is needed to obtain a

Bachelors degree in nursing is passing the national licensing examination called the

National Council Licensure Examination to ensure that they can legally be able to work

(How To Become an RN). Masters degree programs for nursing are also offered for

nurses who want to get higher pay or leadership roles. To earn even higher than a

nurse with a Masters degree a nurse can also receive a Doctorate degree and become

a doctorate-level researcher.

Jobs in the nursing field are continuously becoming more competitive every year

and so is a nurse's salary. This is due to the fact, that people are living longer, chronic

conditions are increasing and the baby boomer population is now aging. So more

nursing positions are needed to help them maintain their health. With the demand for

nurses is increasing the job outlook is projected to increase up to twenty-five percent by

the year 2022, this is faster than average. Specialty nursing jobs are also expected to

increase thirty-one percent (Burgess). The median salary for a full-time nurse is

64,470 dollars which would be about thirty-one dollars and forty-eight cents an hour

(Find Hospital and Healthcare Jobs). The industries that hire the majority of nurses

are state, local and private hospitals. They employ about sixty-one percent of nurses.

Nursing and residential care facilities hire approximately seven percent of nurses and

physicians offices hire the other seven percent of nurses (Salary and Job Growth).

However, a nurse can make more or less depending on which type of medical setting
they work in, what state they live in and depending on how much schooling they have

completed.

Nurses work in many different settings. They can be found in doctors offices,

hospitals, ambulatory care, health clinics, correctional facilities, military facilities and

other places. Nurses can also work in facilities that specialize in care for certain ages

like pediatrics units which just deal with the care of kids or work in facilities that

specialize in the care of geriatrics which specialized in the care of the elderly. Although,

the majority of nurses work in hospitals. Nurses help with administering medications,

communicating with doctors, caring for patients, managing intravenous lines, observing

and recording patients conditions, educating patients on how to self-administer

medication, teach clients about healthcare and the list goes on (What do Nurses Really

Do). Most importantly nurses provide focused and highly personalized care that a

patient will not always receive with a doctor.

To provide highly personalized care they focus on providing direct care and

preventative care. Direct care is provided when a patient cannot complete their daily

living needs. Direct care nurses help with basic tasks like bathing, grooming, eating and

dressing. Nurses would most commonly complete this type of care in a nursing home

or home health facility. A nurse that provides direct care in a home health facility would

help with the items previously mentioned and help with preparing meals, do the grocery

shopping and help with cleaning (Squillace). Preventative care is provided using

differing methods to educate people about illnesses, promote healthy lifestyles and help

with providing treatment for early onset illnesses. Nurses that are in preventative health

care give recommendations that are evidence-based so they encourage patients

receive preventive services. Preventative care nurses try to inspire patients to live

healthy lifestyles by avoiding smoking and drug abuse, control existing diseases,

regular exercise, weight management, and moderated use of alcohol (Preventative

Health Care). These are just two of the areas that nurses impact lives by helping them

to prevent and maintain excellent health.

Nurses spend the most time with patients and ultimately have the most contact

with the patients, so good communication skills are a necessity. Some good

communication skills to have are being a good listener, being friendly, being good at

noticing nonverbal communication, being clear when talking, having respect for patient,

showing sympathy, having empathy, and giving good feedback to patient. Good

communication is not just simply having these traits, experience and schooling play a

big role. Although in the nursing field good communication with a patient is called

therapeutic communication. Therapeutic communication is communication that is face

to face interaction that focuses on advancing the physical and emotional well being of

the patient. In more detail, The purposes of therapeutic communication is first to

determine a provider client relationship identify the client's concerns and problems,

assess clients perception of the problem, recognize the client's needs, and guide the

client towards a satisfying and socially acceptable solution (Therapeutic

Communication). Therapeutic communication and behavioral management go hand in

hand. Behavioral management is used to create an environment that brings out the

best in staff, as well as bring out the highest compliance outcome from patients.

Successful communication is very important in the patient's medical experience.

Nurses can help improve the state of a patient by initiating conversations with patients
and keeping them company. To help a patient respond more a nurse should listen

actively to them instead of passively. This often helps with the well-being of the patient

and the healing process. Being successful in providing personalized care is important.

A nurse needs to possess these qualities in order to do that; have an empathetic

disposition, attention to detail, and good communication skills. Good communication

skills are essential in the whole evaluation process. Not only does good communication

help with the evaluation process is helps develop a closer relationship with their

patients. This makes a patient feel more comfortable about their medical experience, to

be more open about why they need medical attention.

The patient and nurse relationship that is developed, helps a nurse get their job

done. This relationship is called personalized healthcare and is a vital, intangible asset

needed today. Personalized healthcare includes genetics and genomics but also

includes any other biologic information that helps predict risk for disease or how a

patient will respond to treatments (Teng). Personalized health care is needed due to

the excessive amounts of money spent on healthcare, this has made cost an issue.

Some of the lavish spending has been due to the fact that some doctors prescribe

medicines by trial and error. However, this is not very effective because not every

patient responds to medications the same way. This is why personalized health care is

needed, it can help nurses and doctors predict the right type of therapy with the smallest

amount of side effects for the patient. Personalized care has made the whole medical

experience more enjoyable for patients. It improves the quality of the care while

decreasing the cost of money being wasted on medicine that is not needed. Another

way to increase personalized care is to involve the patients in their own care. It is
crucial for the nurse to make sure the patient understands their treatment plan and has

the reassurance that the care they are receiving is the right one for them. This

confidence and reassurance will give the patient an overall satisfactory visit which helps

nurses and doctors provide successful personalized care.

Successful personalized care is important, but nurses will always face challenges

in the workplace to achieve it. Nurses work in a very high stress environment and have

to deal with a lot of problems. With the demand for nurses rising there is a problem with

having a shortage in the nursing staff. Short staffing causes nurses to take on more

responsibilities than they normally have which leads to more errors and it threatens

patients safety. So when short staffing occurs nurses have to be extra careful while

taking care of patients. Short staffing leads to the problem of causing nurses to have

mandatory overtime. Mandatory overtime causes nurses to become burnt out and it

furthers bad habits which does not promote successful personalized care (Alwin).

Another problem nurses face is the exposure to diseases. Nurses regularly come into

health-related risks when they care for patients with highly contagious diseases.

Nurses must make sure they maintain infection prevention to not spread or catch these

illnesses. Although, the healthiest of nurses can still catch these illnesses. The most

important challenge nurses face is violence in the workplace. Workplace violence is a

very serious problem that nurses have to deal with. Between 2012-2014 workplace

violence injury rates have doubled for every classification of healthcare workers

(Gooch). Since this has become a big problem in recent years states are starting to

crack down on workplace violence.

 Although nurses face many challenges, the benefits and advantages outweigh

the negatives. Nursing is a good career for people who want to help others. Nurses

have unlimited potential to make a difference in so many people's lives. Nurses can

literally save someones life or just helping make a difference in someone's life, which

makes the job so gratifying. Since nurses are constantly working they very rarely get

bored, which is good for people who do not like to sit around. Nurses that work at

hospitals do not always have to work from nine to five they can take second shift, third

shift, or have a flexible schedule. They can also sometimes design their own schedule

to match their lives. Nurses can also receive benefits like vacation time, discounted

medical treatments, signing bonuses, some offer one hundred percent reimbursement

for educational costs, and nurses receive insurance (Burman). Nurses also have

excellent job security due to the fact that the nursing field is continually growing. Not

only do nurses have good job security the job opportunities are endless and there is

always room for advancement. The pay is very good for a nurse and there is always

potential to earn more. Although, it does take some effort to earn more, a nurse can

only make but so much just with the pay raises they make. If a nurse wants to make

more money schooling will be necessary.

Ultimately, nursing is a respectable field to work in. There is great demand for

nurses so they will always be needed. Nurses make excellent wages that can increase

over time. A nurse can work in many different type of establishments, where each offer

a unique work environment. Nurses can have flexible work schedules or take different

shifts as desired. A nurse can have the chance to make a difference in many peoples

lives. Making a difference in peoples live can make nursing a very gratifying and
satisfying career for a compassionate nurse. Being a nurse, one will get the opportunity

to communicate with patients, doctors and other medical staff. This communication can

give a nurse the opportunity to learn valuable skills from his or her peers and increase

their personal skills. A nurse can spend time with patients that helps build a lasting

relationship that can help enrich the life experience. This is a bond that patients cannot

have with doctors. Not only do nurses increase their personal skills there is constant

excitement. Nurses never know what could happen which will help them gain the skill of

making swift decisions. The nursing career has unlimited advancements and they can

change their specialty to fit which area they think they would fit best. The skills learned

from being a nurse can be used anywhere. The education learned from nursing can be

used can prepare for any type of emergency. Taking all of this into consideration

nursing is a great field and can be very beneficial to patients as well as being a

satisfying career. Overall, nursing is a challenging health care profession that focuses

on the care of families and individuals whose goal is to help them maintain excellent

health.
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