A Range of Nurse Practitioner Jobs for Certified NPs

There are a ton of jobs that are available for a qualified nurse practitioner. Practitioners work in a ton medical institutions, some of which are hospitals, clinics, airlines, cruise ships, military, operating rooms, emergency rooms, neonatal department. To work in these places, there is absolutely one thing that each practitioner must be, they have to be qualified. 
Qualified practitioners can even deliver babies and perform sutures during a surgery.

Becoming a qualified NP is a serious journey. It's like a long ladder that is going to take some time to climb. A practitioner is an former registered nurse who is now an advanced level nurse. NPs perform tasks that are able to perform tasks similar to a MD. To tell the truth, there are states that have rule and regulations that dictate what a practitioner can do within their scope of practice, the biggest of which whether or not they can work without the supervision of a doctor.

Some states allow this, some states let practitioners work independently with a private practice whereas other states make it mandatory for a NP to work with licensed physicians. Registered nurses and LPNs aren't given the privileges and benefits that a practitioner gets, and they most definitely don't have the freedoms and responsibilities that a nurse practitioner has. This is a rewarding and fulfilling career for passionate people who get a sense of fulfillment helping people, and it most definitely pays well with practitioners making on average $80,000 a year.

Some can make up to six figures depending on specialty, experience and location. So the big question is, "how do you become a NP?" To put it simply, you need to get your bachelors of science in nursing so that you are a working registered nurse. No practitioner program is going to take an applicant who isn't an experience registered nurse, or at least I've never heard of it. The second thing you have to do is get your masters in nursing degree from an accredited institution and you need to complete a practitioner specialization program. Almost every NP program there is will focus on a specialty. Whether it be oncology, pediatrics, family care, or neonatal. There is no exam that is required for you to take so that you can become a certified practitioner. Just finish NP program and get your state license to practice.

A Nurse Practitioner has a higher salary than a RN as I already mentioned. Don't expect to be a practitioner who works a simple 9 to 5. Practitioners work on calls that can come at any time, especially when there aren't doctors available for patients. Because of the fact that practitioners have the training and education that allow them to do tasks similar to doctors, they can be relied on when doctors aren't around.

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The Diverse Roles that a Nurse Practitioner Has

Not a lot of people in the health care industry know this, but almost every Nurse Practitioner started as a Registered Nurse. That's right, a NP is just an RN who went back to school for additional training and to get a graduate level degree so that they could become a practitioner. Practitioner start first by getting the necessary experience they need as an RN because most practitioner programs don't even look at an applicant who doesn't have at least two years of experience working as an registered nurse. Get some experience by working alongside a practitioner or a physician before applying to an NP program.

Jobs for practitioners are available in every medical institution there is in the United States. Practitioners can find work in hospitals, walk in clinics, school or college clinics, sports teams, they can work for companies, they can work in prisons, and they can even have their own private practice. Basically, any where there is an abundant need of health care is a place where a practitioner can work. Practitioners have a ton of freedom in their job. They have the ability to make their own judgments toward patient care.

All most every Nurse Practitioner in the U.S. knows how to provide the basic patient care tasks that are involved in treating common diseases and illnesses. They can perform physical exams for patients, and many can write prescriptions which is a privilege that even RNs don't have.  The majority of states in the United States allows practitioners to write prescriptions for patients. Practitioners can do almost all the tasks of a physician and they can do at a reduced costs, which is why they are so valuable on sports teams and in the poorer rural areas in the U.S. There are some practitioners who are specialists and therefore are greatly depended on when doctors aren't around.

There are practitioners who work in hospices treating the terminally ill, there are some who work in nursing homes treating patients who are suffering from some chronic illness. There are even NPs who have specialized in pathology and oncology treating patients who have cancer or some other type of disease.

A Nurse Practitioner has the necessary education and training that puts them in the position of being able to assist surgeons in emergency rooms, and when there isn't a surgeon around a practitioner can do minute surgeries like biopsies or suturing up a open patient. They have that additional training and advanced education that allows them to do this. Its all the experiences that come with this job that make it so great.

 

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Here are the Challenges that Nurse Practitioners are Facing Today

There has been a huge need for people who want to be a Nurse Practitioner, and this need has been going on for a very long time. Practitioners are just nurses who have a graduate level education that has further trained them to be able to do advanced nursing tasks. By graduate level education I mean that they have achieved either a Masters or Doctoral degree in nursing. Students must enter a NP program that teaches them how to do advanced tasks. These program teach aspiring students how to do things they couldn't do when they were a registered nurse.

Practitioners are being challenged from all angles everyday as they work. Its all about trying to balance out with practitioners working with actual professionals who work with medicine like MDs and the other health care workers such as RNs, CNAs or physician assistants. Practitioners who are in poor rural areas are definitely needed because of the fact that there is a huge lack of doctors around. Because of this practitioners are depended on to do the tasks of a MD. They've practically been trained to be able to most of the tasks of a doctor and it costs significantly less to staff a nurse practitioner.

Practitioners who are in these poor communities do tasks that are similar to a doctor like giving patient advice and consultations, identifying and diagnosing patient illnesses and diseases, they are able to write prescriptions for patients, and they are relied upon to order and interpret laboratory tests. Practitioners can even perform or participate in certain surgeries such as biopsies and sutures. The most difficult thing facing practitioners are making a clear and distinctive representation of the differences between them and all the people they work alongside of.

The biggest problems that NPs have to deal with is the state regulations they have to work within their scope of practice. Some practitioners are allowed to have a private practice in some states whereas in others they can't have a practice independently. Some states require practitioners to be supervised by a physician and some don't, this is concerning overseeing NPs and the treatments they decide to give patients. Back in the 1960s, practitioners weren't even allowed to practice independently because physicians didn't think they should be able to work without supervision.

Nowadays, the Nurse Practitioner is respected and seen as a important asset to the health care industry. Its all about accepting that practitioners may not have been as trained as extensively as doctors, but they are still trained enough to perform the tasks that a doctor can. They are competent and educated workers.

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An Exploration into the Nurse Practitioner Profession

Any Registered Nurse can become an Nurse Practitioner. All an RN has to do is achieve an advanced graduate level education in nursing, such as a Masters degree in nursing or Doctoral degree in nursing. Get some training in learning how to identify and diagnose illnesses and you can become an NP. All practitioners are health care professionals and they have similar privileges of an medical doctor. They can provide patients with services that are most definitely synonymous with those that a physician performs.

The real question though is how did this profession come about and was it a struggle to begin this career? Well, during the 1960s there was an nursing education program started at the University of Colorado by two physicians. These to physicians or educators were Loretta Ford and Henry Silver and they did this because of the fact that there was a serious shortage of health care providers in rural areas.

This job came about mainly because there was a lack of medical services being provided to young children, and it was this program that started the trend of the first practitioners graduating to practice medicine. During this same period, the 1960s, every nurse working at the time was not to pleased with the term and conception of a Nurse Practitioner because of the fact that they thought this nursing program was only teaching aspiring students how to become physicians, not nurses. They felt that this profession was going to confuse the differences between a nurse and a practitioner until the concept of nursing was no longer going to exist.

They felt that eventually everyone would just turn into physicians. All this aversion ceased and deceased when a few years passed and more practitioner programs started being created and more structured. The funny thing is that even though this profession was created in the 1960s, it was only until the year 2000 that practitioners were legally given the right to practice medicine. They could practice in each and every state including the Columbian district, but they were given rule and regulations regarding the scope of their practice and what they could do in each state with the title of  a NP.

There are many men and women working as a Nurse Practitioner who want full autonomy in what they can do in medicine. To put it simply, they are tired of being supervised for everything they do. While its only right to seek consultation from a physician, practitioners have been trained and educated in similar ways of a MD and this is why they feel they should have the right to practice without supervision. This is a great and rewarding medical profession, but it does have its challenges.

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The Salary of a Nurse Practitioner – More than a 9 to 5

The high salary of a Nurse Practitioner is most definitely something that isn't frowned upon. With that said, I can definitely see why a lot of aspiring RNs want to seek a career as a full time practitioner. Even though this career comes with great pay, its more than just a great paycheck. This medical profession is about being having the knowledge and the chance to be able to help someone who is suffering from some type of affliction. Some type of problem that makes it hard for them to live their lives or even get out of bed in the morning.

This is a career that takes passion because it takes passion and dedication to make any career feel fulfilling and rewarding. From state to state, the responsibilities and tasks of a practitioner will vary, and it's the same regarding salary state to state. Everything is different in every state. Depending on the practitioner's area of specialty, their job will be different than that of another practitioner all because of the fact that one of them specializes in a certain field such as pediatric, oncology or family care. The median salary of a Nurse Practitioner in the United States was about $88,000 a year according to data released by the government in September of 2010.

Now even though this is what the government says, there are a ton of benefits and bonuses that a practitioner receives during their career, so if you take into account all of that then a practitioner's salary be up to $120,000 every year which is awesome. With this paycheck comes a health care plan such as the 401K starting at $6,100 and the 403b which begins at $3,335. I haven't even taken into account the amount of money a practitioner who specializes in a field can earn. For example, a Neonatal practitioner's salary comes in at around $65,000 to $95,000 every year.

Salary increase as you gain experience throughout the years obviously. For each and every practitioner who specializes in something, there can still be a salary gap just because of the factors like geographical location, how many years you've worked, how much experience you've gained, and the training and education you achieved. All these factors are taken into account when determining salary, bonuses, benefits, etc.

The career of a Nurse Practitioner most definitely brings in a reliable income that you wouldn't have to worry about. This job provides security because of the fact that each and every there is an increase in demand for practitioners in the health care industry, or at least for the next decade anyway. More importantly though, is the fact that patients will be getting better because of you. There aren't many careers that give a person a proud and satisfying feeling like that.

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Learn About the Online Degree Programs for Nurse Practitioners

For a very long time I have been scratching my head wondering what it means to be a Nurse Practitioner. Finally I realized that the term simply means that an NP is a individual is a Registered Nurse who went through advanced training to become a practitioner, and to be able to do things that an RN can't do. To become a practitioner this former RN has achieved a Master's of Science in Nursing degree or Doctoral of Science in Nursing degree and any other degree that is necessary.

These degrees mainly help one advance their knowledge of business management and diagnosing and treating medical diseases and illnesses. An NP degree is basically a nursing program that gives the aspiring student knowledge of a broad range of health care services and how to perform them correctly. Obviously, to become a practitioner in nursing you have to achieve a license and certificate, and to get these you absolutely have to complete some programs. Its well worth it, this career is very rewarding and fulfilling.

First thing you want to do is make sure you get your associates degree in nursing, and its very easy to get one because of the fact that they are offered through community colleges. If you find that your hopes of becoming a Nurse Practitioner is hindered because of the fact that these colleges aren't around then you can always get them online. Getting an associates degree most often takes at the most about two to three years. In busy world that is today's mainstream society, it most definitely can be difficult to find the time to go back to school and get an additional degree to become a NP.

Because of this, online degree programs are a great alternative to college for those of us who don't have a too much of a flexible schedule. Online NP programs are extremely convenient, flexible and most importantly they are affordable for enrollment. By being in an online program, you have the privilege of finishing on your own time instead of at an semester deadline. The only difference between online school and actual school is the experiences you have with people, its all up to you.

Online Nurse Practitioner programs is the way to go because although the cost per credit might turn out to be the same, you will still save time, you will save money in school fees and you'll save money in gas and books. Its great.

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