Health Careers

Pediatric Nursing Career

A pediatric nursing career is one in which you will be tending the younger generation of patients. This means infants all the way up to teenagers. Not only will you be taking care of young patients but you will do everything you can to support parents and other members of families to be a part of the treatments that your patients require. There are times you may see pediatric spelled with an “a” as in paediatric.

A pediatric nurse’s work responsibilities are many. On any given day she may diagnose and treat any number of infections, as well as coughs, colds, ear aches and diagnose the flu. She may see a patient who has asthma and another that is suffering from migraine headaches. Her work is far reaching and all encompassing.

To work in pediatrics you must enjoy working with youngsters of all ages. You also must be able to identify with the maelstrom of emotions that children go through. You will have patients that are nervous, frightened, and angry and you may find yourself wiping more than a few tears. It takes a special person to be a pediatric nurse. She must be encouraging, supportive, caring, enthusiastic, kind, friendly and have an excellent sense of humor. She also must be able to tap into how best to relate to the age group she is administering to. Those who choose a pediatric nursing career must have extremely good peoples skills. This is necessary in dealing with the patients but also with the family units as well.

Educating and working as part of a close knit team is something that a pediatric nurse must learn to do. She also must be prepared to be independent when it is called for and to make decisions based on her own professional judgment. Direct patient care is an integral part of the job as is being versatile and knowing how to adequately cope with stress. Being a pediatric nurse can bring lots of happiness and fulfillment to a person’s professional life but it can also bring sadness and pain because every patient will not show signs of improvement. A pediatic nurse must take care of sick children who will get well but she also must take care of sick children that will not get well.

Pediatric nurses provide preventative care on an acute basis to patients in a variety of settings. Examples of these include hospitals, clinics, educational institutions and doctor’ offices. This type of nurse can choose to work with only one specific age group such as working with infants or teenagers in a clinic or she may choose to remain in general pediatrics.

To become a pediatric nurse one must first study to become a registered nurse (RN). This can be done in one of three ways. The individual can attend university and earn her Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) degree. The second option is to earn an associate’s degree at a community college or junior college and the third option is to obtain a diploma in nursing. Once the proper education has been obtained the individual must then pass the NCLEX-RN national licensing examination. Only then can she/he  look for work in their chosen field.

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