Nursing Degrees and the Future of Healthcare

Often we hear from the news or read from newspapers that registered nurses (RN) or professional registered nurses are in demand these days. When people hear about registered nurses, the first thing that comes into our minds are those nurses who records your symptoms at the hospital, or someone who gives you shots in the doctors office, but they are also adept on other things.

Becoming a supervisor is common for many registered nurses during their career. Though becoming a supervisor is not for everyone as most of these RNs do not like managing others, they'd be happier working directly with patients inside a hospital.

Many people think that most nurses work at the emergency room or the maternity ward, but a significant number of registered nurses work on specialized departments such as pediatrics. Some nurses work at a doctor's office or medical center and assist the doctor, but other may only work in a laboratory.

People who just got out of the hospital or just had surgery need more personal care at home so health nurses go to their homes to provide care. Personal nurses may also need to attend to patients with cancer or terminal illnesses. Through this, much attention to the patient is given and faster recovery may then be observed.

We can also find registered nurses working on a government and private organizations and institutions. They give medical assistance to the employees of the organization. Other nurses also work for companies in industries at the place of employment to give medical exams to employees.

A nurse supervisor's duty is to train new nurse professionals and setup work schedules for their staff. Aside from becoming a nurse supervisor, and registered nurse can also advance to a registered nurse anesthetists or a certified nurse midwife. This tells us that when you are a registered nurse, there are a lot more career that the health sector can offer.

The development in technology, advancement in drug and treatments, changes in healthcare policies, insurance policies and coverage will definitely reinvent the healthcare profession including nursing in the next few years. As an example, as technology continues to advance, many healthcare functions can become automated.

These includes patients medical records, and use the of smart beds to monitor the patients' vital signs, more use of bar coding, and automated medicine carts which could be used to lessen the time it takes to create a medicine and reduce errors that result from dispensing medical drugs. Voice-activated technology can also be used to lessen the number of people to do several tasks.

Also, tasks such as serving meals or attending to patients can be taken over by trained medical aids in order to free up nurses, and they will be able to provide human touch to their patients.

These days, hospitals and healthcare institutions have to use their staff more often due to nursing shortages. Registered Nurses will be tasked to spend more time or attend at the bedside to serve as educators and coordinators. This will help refocus their true role with their patients. Due to medical cost these days, a patients stay at the hospital are becoming shorter so nurses must make most use of the time they spend with the patients. Nurses also need to learn administrative roles and supervising positions so that they know how to access and retrieve important information and share it with their patients and their families.

The advancement in technology will also likely attract more males and minorities into the nursing profession. Because of this, the government would have to put an emphasis in supporting teaching careers and recruiting instructors with different cultural and educational backgrounds to give support to profession and also minimize the shortage of nursing school instructors. Due to this, more loans and financial scholarships will be increased and will be available to encourage more trained medical professionals to serve as medical instructors or teaching staff. Also, nursing colleges would have to be willing to increase the salaries of medical instructors to get them to retain teaching staff.

As healthcare trends stand today, if the nursing-shortage persists, patients who need assistance most would have to stay longer at the hospital, if this happens, the number of outpatients will definitely increase and the need for home-healthcare nursing professionals will also increase. This only means that nurses will play a bigger role in insurance agencies, health consulting firms, and healthcare and software development companies. Nurses will also be more involved with community health and population-based health work. Nurses tasks is to identify health risks and setting up a plan to help out those people with higher health risks. Healthcare professional and medical staffs will also be involved in educating people how to keep good health, working with healthcare institutions and insurance agencies to develop healthcare programs that are designed to promote health and lessen medical expenses.

Medical personnel who work in gerontology and geriatrics have bright futures in terms of their careers. Medical practitioners in the baby boom generation reaching retirement, new medical professionals will be required to focus more on patients in this generation group. Medical nurses who are also baby boomers might not be ready to retire may find themselves being a consultant. They would serve as healthcare consultants that understand the needs of their patients better.

With the advancing medical technology today, nurses will be required to focus more on preventing diseases and illnesses rather than finding a cure for them. Medical treatment that targets a disease before they even occur will definitely enhance preventative healthcare. People will also need to learn more about preventing illnesses and diseases. Developing methods to prevent illnesses is surely better than finding better options to cure illnesses.

All of us need to prepare regardless of what the future of healthcare holds, nurses and medical professionals will need to be prepared for the expanding and changing roles in the medical practice. They will need to learn everyday in order to remain up-to-date in the medical field. Their roles become easier if one is devoted to his/her profession.

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