Nursing Schools & Degree Programs


Nursing: Largest Sector in the Health Care Field
When asked to associate one profession with the health care industry, most people are likely to volunteer "doctor" as an off-the-cuff response. They're certainly not wrong in doing so, but it is in fact nurses who comprise the largest healthcare occupation, holding about 2.6 million jobs. And with numbers as strong as that, the fact that there exists an almost endless list of nursing specialties comes as no surprise. Nurses work with a vast swath of the community that encompasses geriatric patients and children alike, helping to treat a variety of physical and mental ailments. Irrespective of their specialty, nurses offer treatment, information, and support to both patients and their families. Common job duties involve recording symptoms, administering diagnostic tests, operating machinery, and assisting in rehabilitation efforts.

Nursing Education and Job Opportunities
The path of nursing is unique in that it may be reached by different educational paths. The Bureau of Labor Statistics identifies bachelor's degrees, associate's degrees, and nursing degrees from accredited programs as the most common benchmarks of formal training, noting that advanced nurse practitioners need master's degrees. Students enrolled in nursing schools can expect a curriculum that includes classes in anatomy, physiology, microbiology, chemistry, nutrition, and behavioral sciences. Classroom hours are supplemented by supervised clinical experience in a variety of settings.

As previously mentioned, the settings, patients, and health conditions nurses work to treat vary as much as the individual nurses themselves. Some may choose not to specialize at all, or combine specialties to serve a few well-defined sectors of the population. These nursing occupations include, but are not limited to, the following:
  •   Ambulatory care nurses
  •   Home healthcare nurses
  •   Perioperative nurses
  •   Geriatric nurses
  •   Holistic nurses
  •   Psychiatric/mental health nurses

Nursing schools offer multiple educational paths that lead to one excellent career. Whatever healing skills you have to offer, there exists a nursing specialty tailored to your abilities and interests.
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