Nurses are the backbone of the healthcare system, and their dedicated care is instrumental to ensuring patient care quality. Nursing is indeed a rewarding career, driven by the service of humankind and the gift of healing. However, this career comes with a score of professional challenges, especially occupational stress, and overwhelming schedules.
Nursing professionals work tirelessly to support positive treatment outcomes and help patients navigate deadly diseases and life-threatening conditions. Nurses have to deprioritize their personal lives to focus solely on their professional responsibilities. They struggle with an unhealthy work-life balance and expose themselves to lethal viruses and contagious illnesses.
In recent years, the career dynamics of nursing have evolved dramatically, given the acute shortages of skilled physicians. The healthcare system needs highly skilled and trained nursing professionals, and this demand has given birth to lucrative opportunities. Modern-day nurses can overcome professional challenges by pursuing academic and career advancement and opting for flexible schedules.
Keep reading to explore how nurses cope with their professional challenges by advancing their skills and career.
Pursuing Academic & Career Advancement
Nursing duties are determined by the professional’s skill level and academic training. Administrative roles and long shifts often burden entry-level professionals and RN nurses. They work tirelessly for exhaustingly long hours, leaving them physically and mentally strained. They must monitor patients’ vital signs and recovery progress without enjoying any clinical significance in the treatment design.
Playing an active role in patient care without enjoying any clinical significance can prove demoralizing, as young nurses must follow orders. Carving out clinical significance opens up lucrative leadership roles that come with flexible schedules and direct patient contact. It’s common for registered nurses and BSN professionals to pursue accredited online MSN programs to pursue clinically advanced training. MSN programs allow nurses to carve out specializations in various fields, such as gynecology, geriatric, family nursing, etc.
Specializations open up leadership opportunities that put nurses in charge of teams and patient treatment design. They work closely with physicians and surgeons and enjoy a healthier work-life balance with flexible schedules. MSN nurses enjoy excellent marketability because their advanced skills make them ideally suited to multiple healthcare settings. Combining education with a full-time career can prove daunting, but the e-learning infrastructure offers immense flexibility and accessibility.
Creating a Healthier Work-Life Balance
Working exhaustingly long shifts, spanning over 10-12 hours, is indeed the most formidable challenge for nursing professionals. Nurses are flooded with scores of administrative tasks, patient-care procedures, and tiring shift schedules. In case of emergencies, shifts are often extended beyond their designated schedules. Nurses are expected to burden themselves with excessive loads to ensure smooth care procedures and positive treatment outcomes.
These long and exhausting hours are physically and mentally taxing, resulting in burnout and compromised wellbeing. How can nurses overcome burnout and revive their energies? It’s crucial to work towards a healthy work-life balance by exploring opportunities with flexible schedules. Networking helps nurses stay in the know and explore industry-wide opportunities in numerous healthcare facilities.
All nursing professionals must explore opportunities to fulfill their lives beyond their clinical duties. For instance, working in a clinic offers more flexibility than the hectic shifts in the ER or hospital wings. Seeking employment in a clinic with scheduled patients offers a healthier work-life balance than daily dealing with dozens of patients.
Combatting Occupational Stress
Imagine the amount of stress one experiences while tending to a patient suffering a stroke or a terrible car accident. Many of us freeze and experience nausea at the sight of blood and ghastly injuries. Nurses, however, do not have the luxury even to recoil or express their discomfort while treating patients in bad shape.
The nursing profession is brimming with overwhelming bouts of occupational stress. They must maintain composure to avoid scaring the patients and overwhelming their family members. They perform various services, such as stitching wounds to ensure patient comfort and wellbeing. Aside from the distressing conditions of patients, their exhausting schedules also give rise to occupational stress.
It’s crucial to combat occupational stress by resting up as much as possible during free hours. We advise nurses to enjoy recreational activities that allow them to de-stress and escape their stressful work environments. For instance, nurses can take up yoga or swimming or plan fun get-togethers with their friends and family. It’s also wise to dedicate a few days for relaxation and lazing around, spending time with your children and spouse.
Reducing your Emotional Involvement
The duties that nurses perform are impactful, meaningful, and driven by compassion. Their contact with patients and their families becomes very intimate and personal, resulting in emotional turmoil. Caregiving is a selfless and unconditional act, and it’s natural for nurses to become emotionally invested in the treatment process and outcomes.
Imagine a patient losing the battle between life and death after weeks of tireless care and nurturing. A nurse who is emotionally invested in that patient will carry that trauma and burden for years to come. And this trauma will undermine the nurse’s physical and mental wellbeing and professional capabilities to perform.
Therefore, it’s crucial to reduce emotional involvement and deal with patients holistically and impersonally. Now, that’s not always easy, especially for nurses working with little children and older people. Nurses can combat emotional trauma by pursuing therapeutic outlets, such as counseling and constructive activities.
Seeking help from a professional counselor is crucial to process your emotionally turbulent experiences in healthy ways. You shouldn’t carry the trauma of the life-and-death emergencies you deal with home to your family and children every day. While that’s easier said than done, nurses must find constructive techniques to de-stress and enjoy mental stability.
Exposure to Bacteria, Viruses & Contagious Infections
Nurses tend to suffer from sickness, contagious infections, and airborne viruses. The coronavirus pandemic is a striking example of their risks in continuing professional roles. Thousands of nurses worldwide succumbed to the novel virus after getting exposed during patient care processes. And yet, nurses continued to serve their duties, undeterred by the risk of contracting the virus.
Nurses must closely follow all safety protocols, wear protective gear and prioritize their health and wellbeing.
Final Thoughts
The nursing profession is riddled with many challenges but can be easily overcome with a viable solution. As a skilled professional, you must take charge of your career trajectory by investing in your skills and academic advancement. Nurse leaders enjoy lucrative opportunities that lead to rewarding and flexible careers with higher self-actualization and satisfaction.
