If you have a love for children and you’re preparing to go to nursing school, the field that you might want to consider is pediatric nursing. These are health specialists who are medically trained to work with individuals from the ages of birth through 21. Due to the fact that a lot of hospitals have pediatric floors, it is important for them to have nurses on staff who are constantly available to care for the child and teen patients that come to them for care.
If you’re curious about what some of the different types of jobs in the area of pediatric nursing are, we have enclosed a few of them for you below:
Registered Nurse. Those who go to nursing school to become a Registered Nurse (RN) are eligible to apply for pediatric nursing positions. That’s because they have the general knowledge required to care for this particular demographic. Once you have an RN degree, the smartest thing to do would be to start applying for jobs that are on the pediatric unit.
Pediatric Nurse Practitioner. If you decide to go into the Doctor of Nursing Practice program following your graduation from nursing school, one thing that you can study to become is a pediatric nurse practitioner (PNP). These people are actually able to diagnose children’s illnesses as well as prescribe medication. In many cases, they work very closely with attending physicians at hospitals and medical offices.
Certified Nurse Midwife. Individuals who are passionate about prenatal care as well as labor and delivery may focus on how to become a certified nurse midwife. These are nurses who are specifically trained on how to provide assistance to licensed midwives both in the hospital and also as it relates to home births. As a matter of fact, in many cases, certified midwives make the transition into becoming a licensed midwife after a few years of nursing experience and some additional schooling.
Pediatric Endocrinology Nurse. The endocrine system is the part of our body that includes the adrenal, thyroid and pituitary glands. When a child or adolescent’s endocrine system is malfunctioning, that can cause long term growth challenges (among other things). What a pediatric endocrinology nurse does is work closely with the pediatricians assigned to these kinds of cases to insure that children with illnesses that are related to the endocrine system can get the best possible care.
Certified Pediatric Hematology Oncology Nurse. If you’re someone who is currently taking some CNA classes, then you may have heard of a Certified Pediatric Hematology Oncology Nurse (CPHON) before. Being that hematology is the study of blood and oncology is the study of cancer, then you can probably guess that these kinds of nurses specifically cater to children who have blood disorders and who are diagnosed with various forms of cancer.
As you can see, there are all kinds of specialties within the nursing field. So, if you do decide to go to nursing school and you want to have some kind of pediatrics career, there are many options available to you. For more information on nursing specialties, visit DiscoverNursing.com.