American’s Got Nurses Interview Article – Travel Nurse
Dec 2, 2014 | 12:00 pm
There are those nurses who are perfectly content working in the offices or hospitals where they started for years and grow as they go. There are those who want a little more. They want to see different places. They want to do a little traveling and meet new people and learn new things. For some, being a travel nurse is the perfect way to add some excitement and adventure to their lives.
On Traveling Nursing, in an article titled “A Day in the Life of a Travel Nurse,” Thomas Couturier, RN, BSN, CCRN, ICU, says, “I thought it was the safest and easiest way to experience new places.” He says, “I had never been to California being from Boston before and they made it easy and took care of everything.”
Travel nurses get to enjoy the excitement of exploring new places and new hospitals. Couturier stated, “One of the reasons I like Intensive Care so much is I get to provide the type of care I learned in nursing school.” He says, “Medication is one thing we can control in the hospitals by using the five right checks; the right medication, right dose, right time, right route and the right patient, and goes on to say “I see life and death, but I also see miracles.”
On RN Central, Jennifer Olin, RN, BSN states, “Being a travel nurse can be great fun, but it can also be lonely at times.”
Salary
According the to Bureau of Labor and Statistics, travel nurse make the same wage of registered nurses with a median wage around $65,000 per year; however, on Travel Nurse, it states that they make around $75,000 per year. Apparently, the median wage is between $65,000 and $75,000 per year depending on location, education, experience and employer.
The Joy and Challenges of a Traveling Career
Nursing in itself is demanding and sometimes looking at the same hospital and the same people might not be enough for some. There are those out there who like the excitement and want to see and do more with their careers. In this case, becoming a travel nurse might be the right path to take. It provides extra flexibilities and you get to see new people, new surroundings, and learn new equipment and possibly even cutting edge procedures. Also, there may be some regulation changes from one state to another that a travel nurse would have to become familiar with. Not a bad thing in retrospect. There may also be some other options that one can embark on that they may have not had before. This gives the opportunity to gain more experience and hone some skills and possibly even learn some new skills.
Some travel nurses will have their families travel right along with them, but there are those who travel on their own. They like the fact that everything they need pretty much fit in a car. There is so much compassion that goes with the nursing and medical field.