Navigating your Nursing Education

 

NURSING is a personally rewarding and inspiring career.

 

The historical view of nurses being an assistant to the physician who simply carries out the orders of the physician are no longer accurate.  With the increasing complexity of patient needs and growing technological advancements in healthcare nurses now require greater knowledge, skill and critical thinking.

 

Nursing practice is based on scientific knowledge from the biological, physical, behavioral, and social sciences. Nurses have a strong educational background that prepares them to think critically, care for those with health problems, and use their knowledge to promote health and prevent disease.

Lifelong learning, self-awareness, intellectual ability, and a commitment to professional growth are required of all nurses. All nurses work together with other health practitioners as part of the health care team.

Nurses have choices in areas of specialty, education degrees, and places to work.

 

The Florida Center of Nursing (FCN) estimates that by 2025 Florida will have a shortage of at least 56,000 RN’s and 12,500 LPN’s.  (SEE www.flcenterfornursing.org)

 

Advances in medicine and the increasing complexity of health care delivery systems require a better educated nursing workforce and changes in the way nurses deliver care. A series of reports over the past decade from the Institute of Medicine (IOM), Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, American Hospital Association, National Governor’s Association, Florida’s Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability (OPPAGA) support the need for changes in the health care delivery system.

The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health, a landmark IOM report published in 2010, identifies the nursing profession - the largest health care profession (250,000 in Florida) - as central to providing all Americans access to high-quality, cost-effective care. To help achieve this, the report concludes that: 

• Nurses should practice to the full extent of their education and training.

• Nurses should achieve higher levels of education and training through an improved education system that promotes seamless academic progression. 

• Nurses should be full partners, with physicians and other health care professionals, in redesigning health care in the United States.

These changes in healthcare needs has made nursing a growing profession with critical needs for nurses in all areas of healthcare!

 

For more information about nursing visit:

Discover Nursing (http://www.discovernursing.com)