Difference Between Critical Care Nursing and Other Forms of Nursing
Dec 24, 2014 | 10:00 am
Nursing has many areas of emphasis and specialties. One of these is critical care nursing. Critical care nursing, as the name implies, is fast paced and intensive. It is not for everybody. A critical care nurse will be working with those in need of intensive care.
The Career
Most Critical care nurses work in hospitals, but some can be in-flight nurses and a few outpatient facilities employ them. Your work as critical care nurse requires you to be proficient in many different areas, as you will see patients with a variety of intensive care needs. From AIDS patients to pregnant mothers in car accidents, your daily routine will change more than in other forms of nursing.
Unlike an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) nurse, critical care nurses will also find themselves working in emergency rooms and abroad as field nurses. The types of trauma that they must deal with daily include things like car accidents, gunshot wounds and dismemberment from a variety of sources. However, a Critical Care nurse will also find himself or herse.f working with heart attack and stroke victims.
On a day-to-day basis a Critical Care nurse uses their specialized skill set to determine what course of treatment is best for a patient and how quickly it needs to be administered. They provide advanced life support and assist physicians in providing necessary treatment. They are in charge of following vital signs, administering intravenous medications and fluids and ordering lab tests.
The Abilities You Need
It takes a special personality to work as a Critical Care nurse for a long period of time. Because of the fact that you are dealing with people at their truly worst moments, one must be even-tempered and able to deal with high amounts of stress. It is the Critical Care nurse’s job to keep the patient at the lowest possible stress level in order to quickly and efficiently administer care.
Many nurses can do this for a little while, but may get burned out over time. If you are wondering if this is the job for you, you may wish to try it as a Travel Nurse. Or, ask for placement through a Nursing Agency. This will allow you to try on-the-job Critical Care Nursing or any other nursing job you see fit.
The important thing to remember is you will be the front line in communication between patient and doctor and doctor and the family as well as seeing some immediate and life threatening needs. Your skills will finely be honed and your ability to disengage from personal feelings and see the problem at hand is a huge bonus in this job. Unlike other forms of nursing, you need to be less attached to patients in order to better help everyone.
Critical Care Nursing is the triage of the health services. Decisions you make can make a difference between life and death and that can be truly rewarding and for some people it makes what they do exciting and worthwhile. Other people like moving at a slower pace, getting to know a patient and their families and working through symptoms. If this is you, Critical Care is probably not the arena for you.