Everything You Need to Know About Telemetry Nurses
In every hospital unit, you’re bound to find specialized nurses that devote their training, skills, and time to provide the utmost level of medical care. Monitoring patients remotely after surgeries and other cardiac treatments are at the heart of telemetry nurses’ responsibilities – no pun intended. Whether you’re just starting your journey as a nurse or you’re looking to find a specialization, this is everything you need to know about telemetry nurses.
What is a Telemetry Nurse?
A telemetry nurse works with patients struggling with heart disease, heart failure, and other cardiac conditions. To understand a telemetry nurse, you have to understand the term telemetry, which comes from the words tele meaning “remote” and metron meaning “measure.”
Thus, a telemetry nurse monitors patients using remote electronic signals and specialized equipment. They monitor patients’ progress, provide medical care, and provide specific cardiac interventions in an emergency.
National average salary: $107,536 per year
Job outlook: 7% increase
Where Do Telemetry Nurses Work?
As their name states, telemetry nurses work in the telemetry unit of a hospital. These units provide care for patients leaving the intensive care unit (UCI) that still require consistent monitoring. In the telemetry unit, patients are more stable but even need close monitoring should their situation change.
Sometimes, telemetry nurses also find work in outpatient surgery centers and long-term care facilities. Other medicine areas may also employ a telemetry unit, so nurses may find themselves working with sleep clinics or neurological units.
What Kind of Patients Are On A Telemetry Unit?
The telemetry unit receives a wide range of patients. Most patients need telemetry monitoring, particularly those with a history of high blood pressure, stroke, or a heart attack. Patients in this unit have a high turnout rate because most patients are already stepping down from a more intense level of care.
What Does a Telemetry Nurse Do?
In short, telemetry nurses provide care for patients with cardiovascular issues and related consequences. They perform frequent patient assessments to watch for any changes. This includes measuring blood pressure, levels of consciousness, and breathing patterns.
Telemetry nurses also operate heart monitoring equipment, perform diagnostic tests, and follow protocols to treat chest pain. Most of the time, nurses also assist with procedures like cardioversions and other procedures performed in the telemetry unit. However, their biggest responsibility is recognizing and responding to cardiac emergencies quickly.
The telemetry nurse has a mixture of responsibilities that include registered nurse duties and technical skills to monitor patients’ health.
Most responsibilities include:
- Caring for cardiac patients
- Using electronic equipment like an echocardiogram (EKG) and breathing machines to monitor patients
- Looking for cardiac baseline changes, arrhythmias, and abnormalities
- Responding to irregularities
- Performing stress tests
- Administering IVs and medications
- Monitoring telemetry units of hospitals
- Assisting cardiologists throughout cardiac procedures
- Using diagnostic tests to evaluate patients’ cardiac health
How Do You Become a Telemetry Nurse?
As a baseline, telemetry nurses are registered nurses (RNs). To become an RN, you need to earn either a Professional Nursing Associate’s Degree or a Bachelor of Science in Nursing Degree. You must then pass the National Council Licensure Examination (NCLEX) and meet your state’s requirements for RN licensure.
After obtaining your RN licensure, you can start transitioning into telemetry. Consider speaking with a supervisor about your interest in telemetry and ask how you can train in this specialty. Unlike other specialties, there’s no central organization that focuses on telemetry certification. The two most common credentialing programs include the Academy of Medical-Surgical Nurses (AMSN) and the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN).
Other certifications:
- The Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) certification obtained through the American Heart Association
- The Processive Care Certified (PCCN) certification given by the Association of Critical-Care Nurses
What Skills Do You Need to Be a Telemetry Nurse?
Telemetry nursing is a highly technical environment that requires a more specialized skill set. This career path involves acute care for patients experiencing cardiac problems. The dual nature of telemetry nursing that combines technical and practical skills separates them from other specializations.
Most common skills for telemetry nurses include:
- Understanding of cardiac rhythm monitoring techniques, interpretation, and treatment
- Knowledge of basic and advanced life support procedures
- Knowledge of drug dosage and continuous monitoring
- Knowledge of standard interventions to stabilize patients should an emergency arise
- Understanding of monitoring machinery
Starting Your Telemetry Nursing Career
If the above responsibilities sound like the type of work that interests you, there’s a straightforward path towards becoming a telemetry nurse. With a specialty like this, you could become a coveted travel nurse. At Stability Healthcare, we place nurses in hospitals across the United States in specialties like telemetry. Browse open jobs today!
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Top Benefits of Travel Nursing
Travel Nursing is a career that offers a unique set of perks. It’s one of the only jobs that gives you the opportunity to check off all of the places on your traveling bucket list. If that alone isn’t enough, keep reading to learn why you should be a travel nurse.
Live Anywhere You Want
As we mentioned before, travel nursing will have you checking places off of your bucket list left and right. With short placements, you’ll be able to experiences for just the right amount of time before you head to your next placement. If you near the end of your placement and realize you aren’t done exploring, it’s easy to extend.
Not only can you live in any city or town you want, but you can also live in any living arrangement you want. Live alone in an apartment, a house, a trailer, a treehouse, anywhere. Or even find a roommate or two! Travel nurses often times find a place together during their stays. You can learn more about finding a place to live on our blog.
Have Professional Flexibility + the Ability to Experience Different Work Environments
Being a traveler is great because it creates more opportunities to experience different areas of the hospital and work in different types of hospitals! As a traveler, you’ll be exposed to all types of practices and ways of doing things. Hospitals across the country vary in policy and rules but don’t worry they will fill you in and you won’t be left confused. With different hospitals requiring nurses to do things a certain way or have certain knowledge in a specific area – you’ll be growing your skills every day. If you ever return to a full-time stationary role, hospitals love seeing travel nursing roles on your resume for this exact reason.
In terms of flexibility, being a travel nurse is ideal because you can plan your placements whenever you want to. Once your placement ends at one hospital, you can wait however long you’d like until you pick up your next one. This makes it easier for scheduling off for big life moments and vacations.
Increase Your Earnings
Travel nurses typically see higher pay than the other nurses in the units, this is because a traveler is filling a role that NEEDS to be filled. On top of higher base pay, travelers will still receive the benefits that go along with being a full-time staffer.
Not only do travelers get paid for their work, but they also receive a housing stipend to go towards their living situation.
Job Security
When a hospital is looking for a travel nurse, it is because they need a spot to be filled. That’s right, travelers are always needed. This ensures that as long as your a rockstar in your role, you’re all set and don’t have to worry about facing layoffs or staff cuts. Who doesn’t love job stability 😉
Meet New People
One of the greatest gifts of travel nursing is the people that you meet along the way. Working in different hospitals and living in different places, the opportunities are endless for making new connections. Many travelers will grow out their communities and networks to sizes that they never thought possible leaving them with lifelong professional and personal relationships.
Some travelers will even form a pod and pick up assignments in the same cities so they can all live and experience new cities together.
Finding a Job is Easy
Finding a job is simple at Stability Healthcare. Stability offers an extensive list of travel nursing jobs. All it takes is one click on our website to get started!
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Holiday Treats for the Unit
The holiday season is the perfect time to treat yourself and your coworkers. With things looking a little different in hospitals this holiday season, we wanted to put together some tips on how to bring treats into the break room and a few recipes to boost holiday spirit for yourself and for your fellow nurses.
Etiquette for Bringing Treats into the Break Room
- See if your hospital has any rules or regulations regarding bringing in shared food. This is applicable to any place of work, beyond travel nurses. If your boss says to not pass out treats, abide by those rules.
- Respect everyone’s religions and traditions. Try to not focus your treats on one particular holiday, like Christmas, for example. It’s fine to bring in cookies but refrain from baking them in the shape of a Christmas tree.
- Perhaps the most important question you can ask your coworkers before bringing in treats is if anyone has any allergies. A nut allergy is one of the most common, so a good rule of thumb is to generally avoid recipes that use nuts while bringing food into a common area. Use your best judgment, and if you have the ability to ask coworkers about any allergies, do so before bringing in any food to share. Label what you are bringing in, so coworkers know what they’re biting into.
- Don’t bring anything smelly. Although tuna finger sandwiches may sound like a good idea, particularly potent smelling fish is more likely to cause aromatic issues than anything.
- Consider how messy your treat is. Individually wrapped bags of chocolate may be a better idea than bringing in a cake that everyone has to slice. The easier to grab and consume, the better.
- Clean up afterward (and yes, you can accept help from your coworkers!). Nobody likes a messy breakroom. Make sure to clean up after your shift, and if applicable, store the treats in a safe area if people would like to eat them later on.
Easy Treat Example
Pretzels and rolos are a great, low-budget treat option that can be made in large batches. If you’d like to personalize them, throw them in a small treat bag with a tag with the person’s name on it. Or, a small bag with a tag that boasts a motivational phrase to cheer up your fellow travel nurses would work just as well.
- Purchase your choice of pretzels, like Snyder’s snap pretzels, and a bag of rolos.
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
- On a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, place a row of pretzels. You don’t need much space in between them.
- Then, place one rolo in the center of each pretzel. Bake for roughly 2-3 minutes, or until you see the rolo start to slightly melt on top of the pretzel.
- Voila! Package as you please.
Extra Recipes
Basic Sugar Cookies (recipe from TheNew York Times)
Homemade Rice Krispy Treats (recipe from Shugary Sweets)
Gluten-Free Snowball Cookies (recipe from Allergylicious)
Vegan Peppermint Black Bean Brownies (recipe from Minimalist Baker)
2 Ingredient Dark Chocolate Truffles (recipe from Minimalist Baker)
Coconut Macaroons (recipe from the Huffington Post)
Holiday Popcorn Tins (from the Popcorn Factory)
Ready to get in on the holiday hospital treats? Find your next travel nursing placement at Stability Healthcare!
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Job Highlight: Surgical Spine and Trauma Nurse
Far more than chills run down a person’s spine. Millions of nerves run through the spinal cord and then out into the human body. Our organs depend on the signals being sent.
A surgical spine and trauma nurse specializes in spine health. Many nurses know the importance of spine health, but they have questions about specializing in it.
Look no further. Here is a quick guide to the life of a surgical spine and trauma nurse.
Specializing in Surgical Spine and Trauma
17,000 Americans injure their spines every year. Nearly half of these injuries cause complete damage, in which the individual loses all function below their injury.
Trauma nurses are essential to avoiding complete damage. They treat patients as soon as they come into the emergency room. A nurse must immobilize the spine and monitor the head and spinal cord for damage.
The spine is often injured in multiple ways, with bone and nerve damage. Both kinds of damage need treatment.
Many certified nurses can treat spinal cord injuries without the need to specialize. But the complicated nature of spinal cord injuries means specialty nurses are necessary.
The Life of a Surgical Spine and Trauma Nurse
A surgical spine and trauma nurse has many essential duties. They treat initial injuries in the emergency room, then they take responsibility for spine health.
They prepare a management schedule for patients. They monitor a patient’s reaction to medication, and they adjust prescriptions accordingly.
Nurses follow preadmissions procedures. They need to evaluate a patient’s medical history, medication lists, and allergies. The nurse then determines if the patient is fit for surgery.
After surgery, the nurse helps the patient avoid readmission. They assist the patient in a plan to protect and enhance their spinal health.
They recommend procedures for physical therapy and other outpatient options. Nurses can help patients redesign their personal spaces so they can move around. Nurses can advise patients on equipment they need to manage their injuries.
In surgery rooms, trauma nurses are incredibly important. They prepare the operating room for patients and doctors alike.
They work with instruments, preparing sterile supplies for procedures. They handle anesthetics and pass instruments to the surgeons.
Nurses need several skills to succeed. They need to handle a variety of different patients with courtesy. They need to know basic nursing procedures, then they need to pursue education in spinal health.
But many nurses transition from general practice to surgical spine and trauma health. Once you know the duties of a surgical spine and trauma nurse, you can get underway with your specialty.
Know More About Nursing
A surgical spine and trauma nurse responds to medical emergencies. They treat wounds to the spine and head. They immobilize the spine, then recommend treatments for the patient.
They prepare medications and manage pain. They also assist in surgeries, following preadmissions procedures and recommending physical therapy.
Nurses have many opportunities to specialize and grow. Travel nursing is one opportunity.
Stability HealthCare features a team of leading travel nursing experts. We place doctors in hospitals all over the United States, helping them gain experience in specialties like surgical spine and trauma. Contact us today.
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A Fall Day Off in NYC
Are you currently working in or around NYC? Do you want some inspiration for your next placement? If the answer is yes to either of those questions, then this article is for you! Here are our top November activities in and around NYC:
Wander Around a Museum
Just in time for fall, most museums are reopening with additional COVID guidelines and limited capacity. Don’t miss some of our favorite exhibits, “The Nature of Color” at the American Museum of Natural History and “Studio 54: Night Magic” at the Brooklyn Museum. Tip: make you book a reservation ahead of time!
Visit Storm King Art Center
Hop on the Metro-North or drive a car about an hour north of NYC to visit Storm King Art Center – an outdoor sculpture museum sprawled across several acres of land. Take a look at one of their current featured exhibits, “Outlooks” by Martha Tuttle, which “comprises a series of human-made stone stacks or cairns, built of boulders gathered at Storm King, and molded glass and carved marble stones, which the artist created by hand during the winter and spring of 2020.”
Explore Central Park
The iconic Central Park is at it’s prime in the fall. With the leaves changing, the park is a glorious fall escape from city life. Pack a picnic and make it a day-long excursion or spend multiple trips exploring the 840 acres that make up the park.
Take A Drive
Once you get out of the city, New York is filled with scenic tree-filled routes. Make your best fall playlist, hop in the car, and go explore upstate New York. While apple picking season has mostly come to an end, there are still lots of farms and shops you can stop at along the way.
Scope Out Vintage Finds
With the cold just around the corner, you’ll want to cozy up your space. Spend the day browsing vintage shops to find little pieces that make your place feel warm and comforting. Take a look at Mother of Junk in Williamsburg and Dobbin St. Vintage Co-op in Greenpoint. Keep an eye on our blog later this month for some tips on how to cozy up your space!
See a Drive-In Movie
While not many good things came from COVID, one positive is the increase in outdoor movies. Cuddling up with your favorite blanket and a surplus of snacks to watch a movie under the stars has never sounded so good. Check out Skyline Drive-In in Greenpoint or the Belair in Astoria. If neither of those work, there are locations across all of 5 boroughs.
Discover the Botanical Gardens
Head to the Bronx’s for The New York Botanical Gardens. You’ll see a collection of roses, daylilies, hydrangeas, water lilies, and lotuses, and more. If you can’t make it, you can explore their online exhibits like “Black Botany: The Nature of Black Experience, which seeks to acknowledge the complex relationship between enslaved Black people, nature, and the colonial environment and reconsider the conscious omission of Black knowledge of the natural world.”
Nurses Guide to Properly Preparing for Retirement
Travel nursing is a rewarding career and many individuals choose it for a variety of reasons. Like most health professionals, nurses spend the majority of their time taking care of others and not themselves.
However, if you are a travel nurse, it’s essential to start retirement planning as soon as possible. At the end of your time in the workforce, you want to make sure that you have enough funds to enjoy your retirement after many years of hard work and dedication to patients.
With that said, if you’re looking for retirement resources, this article is for you. Continue reading to learn more about nurse retirement and what you can do to secure your future finances.
Understand Your 401k Options
When it comes to retirement planning, one of the primary problems that travel nurses face is setting up a 401k. As you know, travel nursing usually involves working for various employers, which makes setting up a 401k difficult.
Since travel nursing isn’t a conventional job, some companies may not offer investment plans. Thankfully, nurses who work through Stability Healthcare don’t have to worry about that.
Once you’ve worked with us for one year, we’ll provide you with the details on our 401k plan and how you can enroll through our partner ADP. We have an incredible selection for you to choose from and we want all of our employees to secure their monetary future.
Retirement Planning for Travel Nurses
Now that you know that we offer 401K plan options to our employees, you can take the proper steps towards implementing your retirement financial planning.
Although we require one year of work before you can enroll into our 401k, there are other things you can do to ensure that you are protected financially. Below are a few suggestions:
Save 15% of Your Income
Even without a 401k, there are ways that you can jump-start your retirement planning. One of the smartest things to do as an employee is to pay yourself. Saving 15% of your income ensures that you’re putting away a nice nest egg.
In addition to a 401k, using a Roth IRA allows you to invest money that grows tax-free. The good news is, you won’t be taxed once you take the money out for retirement either.
Your objective should be to continually invest for retirement, even while you concentrate on other financial obligations— like paying off your mortgage. By implementing financial strategies that work in conjunction with one other, you can create a stress-free life after nurse retirement. Therefore, after 20 to 30 years of working, you could have a home that is paid for and a hefty retirement savings.
Tax-Deferred Retirement Plan: Yes or No?
When starting your nurse retirement plan, one of the primary decisions you’ll have to make is whether or not you want a tax-deferred benefit. Basically, Tax-deferred means that you won’t pay taxes on your income right now.
However, you will have to pay them on the funds once you withdraw it. It’s a big decision to make, but it’s one that you’ll have to choose carefully. If you believe you are in a position to pay taxes right now, then do so. That way you won’t have to pay the money after retirement.
On the other hand, if you have lots of financial obligations, you might benefit from saving money on paying taxes and waiting until you have a larger lump sum after retirement.
Retirement Financial Planning: Invest Long-Term
Retirement planning takes a lot of patience and willpower. One of the biggest challenges individuals face when trying to secure their financial future is the impulse to withdraw money from their 401k.
Things happen in life, and when they do most people panic and become riddled with fear and anxiety. In this state of mind, you might decide to pull all the money out of your 401k, which interrupts the consistency of your retirement planning.
It’s important to remember that investing is a marathon, not a sprint. So before you go tampering with your retirement money, make sure you have other savings funds set aside to help you in case of a financial emergency occurs.
Monetary difficulties are examples of situations when saving 15% of your income comes in handy.
Use Professionals to Help With Nurse Retirement
Sometimes it helps to have an expert financial advisor to assist you with your retirement planning. One of the biggest misconceptions is that financial professionals are only helpful to individuals with large salaries. However, people of all tax brackets can benefit greatly from a monetary advisor.
If investing and retirement planning is too big of a task, let an expert assist you. By doing so, you can ensure that you’re set at the end of your working years. Plus, it’ll provide you with someone who holds you accountable.
A financial professional can also offer tips on what you can do in the event of a monetary setback.
Travel Nursing Made Easy
Retirement planning is essential for securing your financial future. But if you’re at a crossroads in your career and need to find your next nursing job, Stability Healthcare can help.
Our free job search platform allows you to view jobs that pay your preferred rate. You’ll get interviews quicker through our platform and begin a rewarding travel nursing assignment in no time.
For questions about our services, feel free to call 855-742 4767. Also, check out our nursing reviews to learn more about how we’ve helped other travel nurses.
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Guide To Changing Your Nursing Specialty
The demand for nurses continues to increase across all areas of healthcare. Nurses with professional expertise in more than one area of care have more options to branch out, especially when it comes to traveling nurses.
Travel nursing compels nurses to be at their professional best. It also provides nurses with the unique opportunity to travel to areas of the world they might not otherwise experience and network with medical professionals from various backgrounds and experience levels.
Travel nursing requires adaptability, a deep well of nursing knowledge, and an eagerness to continuously learn. Nurses with multiple specialties generally enjoy a greater degree of access to travel assignments than their more limited counterparts.
If you are considering adding to your nursing specialties or changing your specialty entirely, here is a guide to help you get started:
Start With a Self-Assessment
Take stock of your nursing strengths and weaknesses. Determine areas in which you would like to improve and consider facets of nursing that perhaps you hadn’t before, in the context of the strongest skill sets.
For example, if you learn fast, are quick on your feet, and have been highly responsive as a floor nurse, then as a travel nurse, you might try your hand at an emergency room assignment. If you enjoy working in pediatrics, you may have a knack for nursing vulnerable patients and might excel in geriatrics as well.
Consider areas that correlate with travel nursing needs and your personal interests. For example, if you have an interest in challenging nursing assignments, then consider cultivating a specialty in intensive care. There is an ongoing demand for travel nurses, so switching to this specialty would pique your interest and increase your chances for frequent placements.
Do Some Research On Different Nursing Specialties
Switching specialties for travel nurses may require little more than brushing up on institutional knowledge or shadowing another nurse to learn policies and procedures for a few days. Other changes in specialties require an advanced degree or an entirely new set of certifications.
Choose a few areas of travel nursing that you are eager to explore and research their qualifications. If you do need to go back to school or obtain another certification, opt for a specialty that is a bit less rigorous to explore while you get the appropriate credentials for your desired option.
Also, peruse job descriptions for your chosen specialties to get a good idea of what may be expected of you in the field. Before you expend the effort to make the switch or take the step of shadowing a fellow nurse for a few days, it is important to ensure that the specialty you are pursuing aligns with your professional goals and skills.
Start Networking
While you are laying the groundwork to get the proper educational credentials or waiting for the perfect travel assignment to open up, start networking. Connect with other nurses that are already working in the specialty to which you are making your move.
Ask questions, glean pertinent advice, and soak up as much information as you can. Nurses working in the field can help you prepare to make the switch as seamlessly as possible.
If you know other nurses who have gone through the process of changing their specialties, ask them about any pitfalls they may have encountered in the process. For a more comprehensive understanding of this process, ask nurses with stationary positions in your local medical facilities as well as other travel nurses.
Plan Ahead To Change Your Nursing Specialty
It is important to be fully prepared before you make the leap to a new nursing specialty. Plan for your transition and time it to ensure you have had enough time to get the proper certifications and educational credentials (if they are needed).
You also want to ensure you have learned enough about your new specialty to feel comfortable caring for patients immediately. You may be excited, but don’t rush the process.
Limit Your Specialties
One of the reasons becoming a multi-specialty nurse is so exciting is because your value increases as a nurse and you become more engaged in learning about your professional all over again.
Professional enthusiasm is a desirable trait, especially for a travel nurse. However, don’t overextend yourself or you risk compromising future patient care. Choose just one or two new specialties to which to expand at a time.
Before you move on to another trait, make sure you have a professional level of expertise to offer the highest quality of care to patients on each assignment. Once you’ve mastered your new specialty, then you can consider learning another.
Prepare Your Professional Materials
A switch to a new nursing specialty means updating your resume with the care qualifications that most match your chosen area and brainstorm possible interview questions about the switch.
If you have already established a relationship with a travel nursing agency, be prepared to demonstrate your competence in this new area and provide any necessary proof of your qualifications. Most agencies will not provide you with an assignment in your new area of expertise if they are not sure of your ability to make the switch.
Alert Your Travel Nursing Agency To The Switch
Reach out to the travel nursing agency from which you receive assignments and let them know you have added a new specialty to your resume. Ask for any nearby assignments they might have to allow you to get your feet wet before traveling on a far-flung assignment for your new specialty.
The benefit of taking a local assignment in your new specialty first is that you have your community-based support network of colleagues on which to fall back if you have questions or concerns about the switch.
Top 4 Most Beautiful Places to Travel in Fall
One of the largest benefits of travel nursing is the ability to pick up and move around the nation, chasing peak seasonal activities in each area. You might spend Spring in Washington, DC to watch the cherry blossoms, summer in California to take advantage of the beaches, and winter in Colorado to ski to your heart’s content.
During the fall, there’s no shortage of beautiful destinations to book your next assignment. To help you narrow down your options, let’s take a look at four of the most picture-perfect autumn destinations for travel nurses.
1. The Smoky Mountains
Great Smoky Mountain National Park is nestled between the western border of Tennessee and the eastern border of North Carolina, meaning you have two states to choose from if you want to work near this gorgeous autumn destination.
The great thing about the Smoky Mountains is that “peak season” for fall colors lasts quite a while. Up at higher elevations, birch trees will turn a beautiful golden color around mid-September. Later in the month and through November, the reds, oranges, and yellows will travel down the mountains and into the valleys below.
2. Maine
Next, let’s travel all the way to the top corner of the United States and visit Maine. Here, the weather is brisk and the air is crisp as early as September, and autumn transitions gracefully into fluffy winter snowfalls near the end of November.
The most popular spot in the state to visit during October is Bar Harbor, well-known for its top-notch dining scene. If you want to get off the beaten path a bit, visit Acadia National Park for a vibrant display of autumn leaves. You can even book a ride on a whale-watching boat, take an idyllic kayaking trip, or cruise along the coast in a windjammer to spot the state’s iconic lighthouses.
3. Vermont
What this tiny northeastern state lacks in big cities it makes up for tenfold in historic towns and a stunning cascade of fall colors. The town of Stowe is no exception. Known as the “Fall Color Capital” of the United States, it might just be the best place in the country to take a scenic hike or drive on a chilly autumn afternoon.
If you’re looking for a little more excitement, try ziplining through the vivid treetops. Afterward, take a moment to slow your pounding heart and enjoy a glass of craft beer. The best thing about working in a state as small as Vermont is that no matter where you’re stationed, you’re only a short trip away from fun activities.
4. New Mexico
Most people associate the east coast and some of the midwest with autumn, but other areas of the country have a lot to offer during this time of year as well.
Take New Mexico, for instance, where you can find one of the country’s most beautiful scenic drives. This 83-mile road starts in Taos and ends in Questa, taking you through the changing colors of desert brush and a stunning landscape. If you’re out at night, look up at the sky for a stargazing experience you won’t forget.
You Can Travel Nurse Across America
Where will travel nursing take you this fall? Whether it’s to the historic towns of Vermont or the peaks of the Smoky Mountains, autumn is certainly one of the best times to relocate as a travel nurse.
If you’re not sure where to go, Stability Healthcare can help. Visit our site to search through open jobs by location, schedule an interview, and get hired for your next travel assignment.
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Elements to Include in Your Travel Nurse Resume
If there’s one thing we can all agree on, it’s that writing a resume isn’t an easy task. It’s something that most nurses don’t even go over in nursing school in the first place. With travel nursing jobs on the rise during the COVID-19 pandemic, lots nurses are revisiting their resumes. A travel nurse resume has some key differences from a regular nursing resume, and yours may need some refining.
If you’re trying to get that travel nursing job you dream about, make sure to include these five things.
1. Certifications & Licenses
If there’s one thing you can’t forget on a travel nurse resume, it’s your certificates.
There are a number of certifications you need to become a travel nurse. These often include a Master of Science in Nursing and a related nursing specialty certificate. You should always mention these in as much detail as possible, as well as any other certificates you may have.
The more certificates you can show off, the more qualified you’ll appear.
2. Relevant Work History
You want to be as honest and open about your work history as possible on your resume.
Include full details on every nursing job you’ve ever had, and give your potential employer all the details they need to follow-up on your jobs. Details to write-in include:
- Job title and description of that title
- Name/location of the facility, type of facility, contact details
- Exact start and end dates
- Number of beds in facility, unit you worked in
- Specific duties completed
The more details you can give on your previous jobs the better. This shows you as a working professional. Only include relevant jobs — that grocery store clerk job you had as a teenager likely doesn’t have too much pull on a travel nursing job.
3. Professional Prose, Action Words
The best resumes use not just professional wording, but action words to hook the reader in.
Always triple-check your resume for spelling and grammar errors and awkward phrasing. You can even bring your resume to a professional to have it checked over if that’s not your strong suit. Once the language is perfect, it’s time to mix in some action words.
Action words like tested, administered, and coordinated may be suitable on a nursing resume. Fit them in where they make sense, and don’t overstuff your resume. These words will help keep your resume exciting when used tactfully.
4. Education
You worked hard for your education, so flaunt it on your resume.
Include the full details of where you went to school, for how long, a full address and telephone number. List the degree achieved, your GPA, and any references you may have made there. If you did any interning, or any specialty courses while in school, mention those too.
5. Custom Summary
You should always tailor your cover letter for each travel nursing job, but that goes for resumes, too.
Study the position before you apply and tailor your professional summary to it. Highlight how you can help in the specific position, and include buzzwords you think they’ll like. The more you study the assignment listing and company (check social media pages, company website, etc.) the better you can pull this off.
Submit the Best Travel Nurse Resume Every Time
Your travel nurse career starts with a standout travel nurse resume. Follow the five tips above and wow the travel nursing agency every time!
If you need a good travel nursing agency to find your next assignment, click here to see what Stability can do for you.
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The Benefits of Intermittent Fasting for Nurses
From childhood, it’s been drummed in all our brains that breakfast is the most important meal. If you skip it, you’re just hurting yourself! But now a new eating trend picking up some steam in the health/nutrition world is saying just the opposite: Go ahead, skip breakfast. It’s actually better for you.
Can this possibly be true? Let’s examine the benefits of intermittent fasting for a travel nurse.
First, what exactly is intermittent fasting? The name sounds complicated, but it’s really not. It’s all about adjusting the cycle between fasting and eating. We already have a cycle in place even if it’s not something we actively think about. The time between when you eat dinner and when you eat breakfast is technically a pretty significant fast (usually between 10-12 hours if you forgo a midnight snack). But in an intermittent fast, this gap widens a little bit. While it varies, this type of fasting usually requires that you avoid any form of calorie intake for about 16 hours. Or put a different way, you are only consuming food ideally from 6-8 hours each day. For energy purposes you want this period to extend some time in the middle of the day. Let’s say you don’t eat until noon and stop eating around 6 or 7 p.m.. So yeah, basically you skip breakfast.
For practical reasons alone, this is a routine that fits pretty well with the work hours of a day nurse. If you’re expected to go in early, 7 a.m. or earlier, it can seem like a hassle to get breakfast ready at the crack of dawn. It’s also not useful. If you eat breakfast at 5 a.m., you are bound to be hungry two hours later, right when your work starts to pick up. So much for that breakfast energy! Mornings are usually busy and hectic in a hospital or clinic. There’s not much of a window to take a breakfast break. So delaying your eating until lunch makes sense. It also makes sense to try and get your dinner over with before your shift actually ends. Getting off at 7, driving home, and having to prepare dinner leaves you eating at 8:30 or 9 o’clock at night, which is bad for your sleep and digestive cycles. Might as well take a quick break and come home fed, ready to watch Netflix and go to sleep.
But are there health and energy benefits? Why yes there are! The first one I mentioned above, it’s much better for your sleep cycle if you’re not eating right before bed, because you sleep better if your body isn’t digesting.
Speaking of digesting, sometimes it’s our instinct to snack regularly throughout the day to curb any feelings of hunger. But intermittent fasting is centered on the idea that your body actually needs a lot of time in between eating, and if you give it that time, you’ll start to curb those feelings of hunger and also reap several other benefits. A lot happens in your body when you take a break from eating. It undergoes cellular repair processes, growth hormones form that help you burn fat and your insulin levels drop (which might not be great if you have type 1 diabetes). Ultimately, you’re giving your body the time it needs to go through all these good processes with the energy you’ve already given it. Imagine your body is like an assembly line. You drop in one item and it has to undergo all of this work before you drop in another, and if you drop in another item too soon, the assembly line clogs up.
So what are some of the results you can see from intermittent fasting? It’s proven to help some in losing weight. There’s one obvious reason this could be true: if you’re only eating 6 hours of the day, you’re probably just eating less than you normally would. And it is proven that when you reduce your calorie intake, your body will start using your stored fat for energy. It’s also just more attainable than dieting. Limiting how much you eat day by day is a lot easier for some than restricting what you can eat. But those bodily processes that happen while fasting, mentioned above, also can play a factor in weight loss. Lower insulin levels and higher growth hormone levels, which both develop when you fast for extended periods of time, facilitate in increasing the body’s metabolism, and thus burning fat more quickly.
There are other benefits, like lowering your risk of Type 2 diabetes and increasing your liver function. On a day to day level, while you might struggle maintaining energy while adjusting to this new eating schedule, most people who intermittently fast report having more energy throughout the day and being able to focus better.
Some studies even say intermittent fasting increases your lifespan. So what are you waiting for? Skip breakfast!
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