As the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic is left behind, it’s more obvious than ever that nursing and nurses will always be a noble and essential profession no matter the state of the world. 

Health systems across the world have been strained heavily by the impact of the pandemic, with reports widely suggesting that nursing staff have been subject to long hours, little rest, and the constant pressure of dealing with patients on ventilators and oxygen. 

Yet, here you are – nursing is a profession of passion, dedication, commitment, and understanding – so for many nurses, entering the profession was not a matter of if, but when, as the idea of helping fellow citizens when they need it most is enough to trump any worries of stress, hardship or lack of holiday. 

However, the journey from knowing you want to become a nurse to actually becoming one is long, with many years of study required to fully comprehend everything you need to know before stepping out onto the hospital ward as a fully fledged professional nurse. 

Read on below to find out more about what exactly this journey entails. From identifying the path you want to pursue in the sprawling and complex world of nursing, onward to securing a degree that will prepare you both academically and vocationally, as well as achieving official certification in your chosen field of nursing.

Choose your Nursing path 

While all prospective nurses share the passion, dedication, and need to help those with medical issues, the vast array of roles within the nursing profession provides the variation needed to ensure that the staff's different wants and needs within the workplace are met. 

With some roles focusing on hands on work, and with others more geared towards administration and ensuring the effective operations of the nursing team, a workforce with both highly specialized and generally well-equipped nursing staff is essential in ensuring the complete success of a nursing department.

Where do you fit into the nursing ecosystem? If you’re less than perfectly comfortable working hands on with patients, administrator roles may be more for you. However, if a day at work is better spent on your feet, actively engaging, then it may be wiser to aim for nursing roles on the hospital floor.

It’s a great time to go into nursing 

Whichever pathway you decide on for your nursing career, nursing is a rapidly expanding profession in the USA. With the birth of new technologies and trends as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as the realities of an aging population, and current nurses retiring following the pandemic, there is ample opportunity to set your sights on a role and dedicate yourself to reaching it.

Those within the nursing profession have observed the shifts in attitudes and objectives since the pandemic began. There is a shift towards focusing on the level of patient control over their care, as well as optimizing logistics so that administration involves managing streamlined and effective nursing systems, rather than managing individual nurses themselves. 

During this time of both technological and logistical development within the nursing industry, young, bright minds with an affinity for emerging tech and systems are needed more than ever. 

The different types of nursing role 

Within the nursing profession, there is an endless list of responsibilities that need effectively and efficiently dealt with, as the focus is always on the needs of patients and ensuring that they have the best standard of care possible. 

This means that there is a wide range of roles, each with different specific operational responsibilities, in ensuring the full care needs of the patient are met at all times with no room for confusion or crossed wires. 

No matter the role a prospective nurse wants to undertake, all certified nurses have been subject to rigorous education involving both academic and hands-on study, ensuring a base level of knowledge and understanding at all times.

Registered Nurses, or RNs, make up the bulk of the United States healthcare force, taking on a number of critical responsibilities such as:

• Health exams 
• Counseling and education 
• Administering medication and other patient requirements
• Performing a wider role in the coordination of care in collaboration with the wider team of specialists and staff.

With such critical and widely required responsibilities, it’s no surprise that there are over 3 million Registered Nurses in the United States, with over 60% working in a hospital setting. However, a hospital is just one of a huge number of places the services of a nurse could be needed, with nurses often required to carry out responsibilities in places such as clinics, home-care situations, within schools, the military, and other governmental organizations too.

While nursing is typically envisioned as something that takes place within hospitals, this isn’t necessarily true – you could find yourself in one of any number of varying places where responsibilities will differ, and you need to be able to adapt, learn and excel.

To become a Registered Nurse, a minimum of a BSN (Bachelor of Science in Nursing) is required – but once this has been achieved, the options for specialization into more advanced fields are varied and numerous.

For example, to become an Advanced Practice Registered Nurse, a minimum of a master’s degree is required – this is in order to prepare you for the increased responsibilities, a greater duty of care, and engagement in optimizing institution-wide systems of care for greater efficiency and effectiveness.

Read on to find out more about the routes to achieving a Nursing qualification, and how once the basic qualification has been achieved, there is a huge variety of specialized roles that could provide the perfect route into your desired nursing profession.

Studying for a Nursing Degree

Entering the nursing profession is often associated with many years of study, especially if a prospective nurse wants to continue studying towards further qualifications, such as a master’s degree, to enter the workforce at a higher pay grade with more responsibility.

While qualifying to become a nurse will always be a case of studying for years rather than months, the options available mean that depending on your specific life situation and requirements, studying to become a Registered Nurse can be done over a period of as little as two years, or as much as four. 

It’s worth carefully considering your options before entering into a particular course. Once you have enrolled, switching to another course becomes more difficult without incurring losses to time, energy, and finances. 

Types of Nursing Degree 

Below is a list of nursing qualifications that will earn you the title of Registered Nurse, as well as provide you with the skills, experience, and know-how to perform nursing responsibilities thoroughly and effectively:

• Nursing diplomas 
• Associate Degree in Nursing (ADN) 
• Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) 
• Accelerated BSN Programs (ABSN)
• Master of Science in Nursing (BSN) 
• Doctoral degrees (DNP, ND, PhD, DNSc).

While earning one of the above degrees will provide you with the qualification you need to pursue a career in nursing, each degree is appropriate for differing circumstances. Studying to become a nurse is a highly energy-intensive undertaking, so it’s important to strike a balance between achieving the qualification you want and making sure to fit it in around your current life situation.

Despite the fact that the nursing sector is expanding in the USA, industries continue to be ever-more competitive as access to high levels of education allows more students to achieve higher qualifications. This means that while an Associate Degree in Nursing will only take two years to study for, you will have less expertise and experience than another nursing student who has studied for a four year Bachelor of Science in Nursing. With a high number of students achieving an Associate Degree in Nursing, this could leave you with fewer opportunities for employment as you look to establish yourself in the industry.

However, these are not the only two options available to those looking to acquire their first nursing qualification. Accelerated Bachelor of Science in Nursing programs, or ABSNs, provide the opportunity for those already with an undergraduate to undertake a further, streamlined course that will qualify them as a registered nurse over an intensive 16 month period. 

This means that if you have spent time focusing on another career path but have had a change of heart or would like to finally pursue the nursing career you’ve been holding off on, there are options available that could have you working on the hospital floor in a year and a half’s time.

Specializing your Nursing Role

It’s possible that while undertaking the degree program of your choice, you’ll learn more about the specific roles that need filling within a typical nursing department and decide that a particular role is the one for you. This could be as a result of learning about the roles within your academic studies or from having a positive experience taking on one of these roles as part of your hands-on experience.

These roles include,

• Administration
• Nursing Consultation 
• Advanced Nursing
• Teaching 
• Research

Once you have established the specific field of nursing that you would like to head into, considering your next steps after completing your Diploma, Bachelors, or Accelerated Bachelors will allow you to decide whether to take on further education as a Master of Science or Doctoral Degree. Again, it’s worth considering whether you want to head into the workforce to begin your career or continue studying towards further specialization and a higher pay grade.

However, once you have completed your studies, there are still a few steps to complete before you’re a fully-fledged, qualified nurse working in the profession of your choice.

Nursing Licensure and Certifications

Licensure

In order to operate as a nurse within the United States, it is mandatory to acquire licensure so that you are fully signed off as a working professional.

This involves a number of standard processes that all nurses have to complete, including passing the NCLEX-RN exam and acquiring a license from the relevant State authorities. The NCLEX-RN exam is a comprehensive test of a student’s capabilities. Questions are asked depending on the answer to the previous question, allowing the authorities to evaluate your suggested capabilities as a nurse going forward. 

Achieving your license to practice as a nurse can only be done once the test is complete, and the student has also passed their relevant Diploma, Bachelors or Accelerated Bachelors, as well as completing the mandated hands-on experience as part of this qualification. 

It’s essentially the final step along the long road to nurse hood – but this makes it nonetheless important and will require a final push to finally achieve a nursing license. Every state in the US has varying criteria that need to be met in order to start practicing, so it’s important to read up on how your state’s law affects which actions you need to take – in some states, you may need to take on additional training hours, and on a federal level, Registered Nurses will need to reapply for their license every three to four years.

Certifications 

While it is not mandatory for qualified Registered Nurses to achieve certifications in order to practice, certifications will provide you with the opportunity to further develop your career while also showing your eagerness to carry on learning even after your studies have been completed.

Much like the NCLEX-RN exam, achieving a nursing certification will entail participating in an educational course for a number of hours, as well as completing an exam at the end of the course to demonstrate that the knowledge has been learned. 

The list of certifications available is extremely comprehensive, allowing nurses to highly specialize in fields such as diabetes with an Advanced Diabetes Management certification or begin working in mental health with a certification in being an Adult Psychiatric Mental-Health Practitioner.

Once you have finished your studies and achieved certification, whether you decide to focus your energy on working or continue with further study, the options for a career in nursing are extensive and varied.