What Are The Educational Requirements For A Registered Nurse
While it may seem obvious that you'll need a nursing education to become a nurse, there are few things to know near how to proceed. Nursing is a field with many pathways. The required degree level and other qualifications you'll need to break into and accelerate in the profession depend on your career aspirations.
Fortunately, there is a range of options: from the bedside to the boardroom, hospitals to hospices, schools to specialty niches, and opportunities in betwixt.
Some types of nurses and their required level of education include:
- Surgical Assistant Registered Nurse: Associate in nursing (bachelor's in nursing preferred)
- Disquisitional Care Registered Nurse: Bachelor's in nursing
- Nurse Case Manager: Bachelor's in nursing
- Clinical Nurse Specialist: Primary's in nursing
- Nurse Practitioner: Primary's in nursing
Whether you lot take a sure patient population in mind or you know you want to become a nurse practitioner, the key to achieving your goals is to identify your interests and aspirations and then build on your credentials and experiences along the way.
How to Go a Nurse
Nearly nurses begin with an acquaintance or bachelor'due south degree in nursing. Some will then earn an advanced degree, further specializing their practice and gaining greater industry expertise.
What Qualifications Do You Need to Become a Nurse?
Regardless of which educational pathway is correct for you, you lot'll need to pass the National Council Licensure Examination, or NCLEX-RN, to become a licensed registered nurse (RN).
Earning this credential is the minimum qualification needed to become a nurse. To sit for the exam, you'll demand an Associate Degree in Nursing (ADN), nursing diploma or Available of Scientific discipline in Nursing (BSN).
The ideal path to achieving a nursing degree should align with your professional goals while also building on your experience in the healthcare field. With that in mind, let'due south look at the different nursing caste options available to you, should you want to become a nurse or grow your nursing career.
So, What Are the Different Types of Nursing Degrees?
There are several levels of nursing degrees to consider as you lot map out your career path, from undergraduate options that can aid you establish your career to avant-garde degrees that tin can become yous where you desire to go.
Associate Degree in Nursing or Nursing Diploma
One educational pathway, and perhaps the start step to condign a registered nurse is earning an ADN from a two-year program at a community college or vocational school or a diploma from an approved nursing plan.
"While a BSN is the optimal way to go, some second caste or non-traditional students might choose one of these options," said Dr. Peggy Moriarty-Litz, chief nursing administrator at Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU).
An ADN or diploma is too an educational stepping stone for licensed practical nurses (LPNs), the health services professionals who provide basic nursing care under the direction of RNs. If an LPN aspires to become an RN, this incremental approach "is a great way to earn some money while going to schoolhouse," Moriarty-Litz said. "It likewise lets LPNs build upon their foundational educational knowledge."
While the nursing profession embraces nurses from all backgrounds and levels, "we encourage them to continue on their educational activity to earn a baccalaureate caste, a master'due south degree and even across," said Moriarty-Litz.
To this end, many colleges and universities offering degree programs that build on a student's existing credentials, such as the:
- LPN to BSN
- RN to BSN
- RN to MSN
These bridging degree programs permit y'all develop your professional identity every bit an RN. At the aforementioned time, you progress in your career past opening doors to nursing positions in an array of settings, from hospitals and md's offices to schools and long-term care facilities.
Bachelor of Science in Nursing
"A baccalaureate education is the preferred route for preparing someone to take the licensure exam in nursing," said Moriarty-Litz. A bachelor'due south degree in nursing can take virtually four years to complete and is offered at accredited colleges and universities.
"A nurse prepared at the baccalaureate level is required to take the knowledge, skills and attitudes to deal with the increasing complication of patient care, which is the consequence of increased life expectancy, a more than various patient population and rapid patient turnover in infirmary admissions," Moriarty-Litz said.
In add-on to the necessary science education, BSN-prepared nurses learn soft skills that are, in fact, vital skills in the profession. Co-ordinate to Moriarty-Litz, these skills include:
- Communication: This means being able to antipodal clearly and finer with people (patients and colleagues) from various backgrounds and cultures.
- Collaboration: Working as part of inter-professional teams, including doctors, pharmacists, medical technicians and caseworkers, has go the standard of nursing and all health professions education, according to the National League for Nursing (NLN PDF source).
- Disquisitional thinking: Problem-solving through interpreting, analyzing and evaluating is accounted an essential skill for nurses by an "Acta Informatica Medica" periodical article.
- Organisation: "It'south important for nurses to be organized and methodical in how they arroyo their responsibilities, peculiarly since many aspects of nursing intendance are time-sensitive," Moriarty-Litz said.
Finally, hospitals employing larger numbers of BSN-educated nurses are associated with decreased patient mortality rates, co-ordinate to inquiry by Dr. Linda H. Aiken and her co-authors.
In other words, nurses holding a bachelor'southward degree will be sought-later on in the workforce. Many employers of nurses crave or prefer new hires to have a BSN, co-ordinate to a 2021 AACN survey. Sometimes employers will provide registered nurses a specific timeframe to earn the degree.
Larn more virtually what a BSN is and why information technology pays to advance with i.
Advanced Degrees in Nursing
According to the IOM report, nurses with graduate degrees are needed to "assume roles in advanced do, leadership, teaching and enquiry." The IOM continues:
"While 13% of nurses concur a graduate degree, fewer than 1% have a doctoral degree. Nurses with doctorates are needed to teach future generations of nurses and to conduct research that becomes the basis for improvements in nursing scientific discipline and do."
Avant-garde degrees in nursing include:
- Master of Scientific discipline in Nursing (MSN): Advanced practice nurses similar nurse practitioners (NPs), clinical nurse specialists (CNSs), certified registered nurse anesthetist (CRNAs) and certified nurse-midwives (CNMs) crave an MSN degree and are helping to extend the achieve of primary care, according to the AACN. You may elect to narrow your focus within an MSN program – peradventure with an MSN in Healthcare Quality and Safety, Population Health or Nurse Executive Leadership.
- Principal's in Nursing Education: For nurses with an bent for instruction or mentoring, a principal'south in nursing education lets you railroad train and educate current and future nurses. While the demand for nursing programs is great, many institutions lack prepared nurse educators, co-ordinate to Moriarty-Litz. According to the AACN, 80,407 qualified nursing school applicants were turned abroad in 2019 due in part to a faculty shortage. An advanced caste in nursing education can fix you to piece of work in educational settings, such as schools of nursing or universities, while clinical educatortracks train y'all to work every bit a staff educator in long-term intendance or astute care settings. "Nursing education is a wide-open field with needs for instructors in face-to-face likewise every bit online educational programs," Moriarty-Litz said.
- Dual Degree Programs: These programs let you specialize past combining an MSN with a second avant-garde degree, such as a Principal of Business Administration (MBA), Master of Public Wellness (MPH), Master of Health Administration (MHA) and other related principal's degrees.
- Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) or Doc of Nursing Practice (DNP): The former trains scientists and researchers, while the latter targets practitioners. Yet both accelerate nursing practise, wrote Shaké Ketefian and Richard Westward. Redman in their journal article examining the programs.
If you want to explore the role a graduate nursing program can play in your nursing career, learn more near what an MSN caste is.
Is Nursing School Difficult?
Succeeding in a nursing program takes endeavor and a dandy deal of determination. If you're already practicing in the field as an RN or working in another career, you may consider attention an online nursing school that tin offer you greater flexibility than you lot might get on a traditional college campus.
If you've ever considered the field of nursing, the current nursing shortage indicates that now is the time to change that consideration into a solid to-do. A lot of factors, from a changing healthcare system to crumbling Baby Boomers and many Registered Nurses (RNs) nearing retirement, are contributing to a "disquisitional shortage for nurses" in the U.S., according to the American Nursing Association (ANA).
The shortage means RNs are projected to see employment growth of nine% by 2030, faster than the average for all occupations, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reports.
How Long is Nursing School?
The length of nursing school depends on the degree yous choose. For example, an ADN is typically considered a ii-twelvemonth caste, while a BSN usually takes four years. Ultimately, the type of degree you lot need to become a nurse depends, in part, on the kind of nurse you lot want to exist.
The number of terms your school offers each year, coupled with the number of courses you lot can take, tin can also adjust your timeline. If you accept whatsoever transfer credits from an unencumbered RN license or previous college experiences, you may be able to stop faster if you nourish a transfer-friendly schoolhouse.
How Long Does information technology Have to Get a Registered Nurse?
If you pursue an associate degree in nursing, that's typically a two-year program that prepares yous to sit down for the NCLEX exam. The timeline all depends on your pacing and the establishment in which you begin your nursing education.
Some nurses obtain their RN license earlier moving on to a bachelor's degree. If you choose to become an RN first, you can get-go practicing in the field while working toward your adjacent credential – pairing your experience with your education.
How Many Credit Hours Does information technology Accept to Get a Nurse?
The plan y'all are pursuing determines the number of credit hours it takes to earn a nursing degree. If y'all're wondering what a credit hour is, the U.S. Section of Education (DOE) defines it as one hour of class fourth dimension and two hours of student preparation time per week over the course of a semester or quarter.
A BSN at SNHU, for example, is 120 credits, just your unencumbered RN license counts toward 45 of those, and y'all can transfer in upwards to 45 more. So, that would leave just xxx additional credits you would need to complete.
Should you lot wish to earn an MSN, yous'll find that many tracks are 36 credits in length – or about 12 courses. Some colleges offer RN-to-MSN programs for those who want to advance their educational timeline.
Whichever nursing path you choose, you're positioning yourself to brand a difference in healthcare and the lives of others while creating a career with incredible opportunities.
Detect more nearly SNHU'due south online RN to BSN Degree: Find out what courses you'll take, skills you can learn and how to request information about the program.
Sofia Tokar is a freelance copywriter and editor in higher education. Follow her on Twitter @stokar or connect on LinkedIn.
Source: https://www.snhu.edu/about-us/newsroom/health/what-degree-do-you-need-to-be-a-nurse
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