One of the most rapidly growing industries in the United States, as well as the world over is medicine, with medical employment becoming one of the most lucrative fields to enter. When first entering the job arena, a graduate nurse can literally command top salaries from their first day on the job. Medicine, from nuclear medicine technicians, to massage therapy, and particularly nursing, is rapidly emerging as a critical field, with employee shortages in nearly every aspect of medicine.
What Constitutes Medical Employment?
Medical employment encompasses multiple fields. It may be inclusive of nursing, medical assistant, certified nursing assistant, nuclear medicine technician, occupational therapy and many others. If in fact the work that you are doing is with clients who are in need of resolutions to health care problems, regardless of their cause, your work will likely be considered medical employment.
The varying fields of medicine will take diverse amounts of time to train for. For example, a paramedic, whose practice encompasses pre-hospital medicine, will train about a year, while an LPN will require approximately 15 months. An RN may take from one to four years of training, dependent upon the degree he or she pursues. Educational requirements will vary even or the physican, with the basic essentials requiring from 8-12 years, while specialties may take upward of four years further education.
Costs involved may vary from approximately 5000 dollars to train in paramedics, while licensed practical nurses, or registered nurses may incur expenses that are in excess of 10-20,000 dollars to complete their training. Nuclear medicine technicians, medical assistants and occupational therapy assistants will of course incur less expense and less schooling time, but their earnings will be somewhat less than the nurse or paramedic will earn as an hourly wage. Physician training will of course be far more costly, but the financial rewards will also be far greater.
The responsibilities and duties which are part of your medical employment will of course be dependent upon the type of medical training and employment that you pursue. The paramedic will see pre-hospital care in ambulance and rescue service, while the emergency room physician may deal with traumatic injuries, and the surgeon will of course function in an operating room. Nursing, both RN and LPN will see a great deal of hands on care and will deal personally with patients medication, surgery, geriatrics, injections and treatments, as well as a wide array of different record keeping duties, and often will also be involved in the care planning of each patient.
Aside from the typical training and essential skills acquired, there are other prerequisites for those who enter the medical employment arena. You will be subject to more stringent measures so far as standards of care, as well a pre-employment screening, most notably for drug and alcohol, as well as other illegal substances.
A Medical Employment Career
Typically medical employment is minimal in its competition, aside from competing for such positions in the facilities as perhaps, Head of department, Director of Nursing or other such specialties. These quite often require a specific number of years in the field prior to application for the position. The career path for those who are in medical employment positions is generally always upwardly mobile. Your beginnings as a new graduate of a medical profession offer you merely a foot into the door. The possibilities are limitless, including flying paramedics, in flight nursing, personal nurse or physician. Given the shortage of health professionals today, your possibilities in medical employment are endless.
Medical careers are not typical and thus no typical career path is predictable for you. Your imagination, what you would like to achieve as a nurse, or doctor or nuclear medicine technologist will dictate the path that your career takes. It can take you to Brazil as part of a research team, or to a cancer care unit, working with the patients that touch you most deeply. Job specializing is common in medical employment, with many nurses selecting to specialize in fields such as medical surgical, geriatrics, or pediatrics, while physicians too will select the fields which interest them the most and apply themselves to become specialists in those fields, including perhaps, surgery, laser surgery, or even endocrinology.
Salaries and Benefits in Medical Employment.
Your salary in medical employment will be dictated largely by where you select to practice, what your field of expertise is, and whether or not the medical employment field in your area is critically short. Typically medical employment offers a competitive, if not lucrative wage to the employee, with nursing fields offering wages that range from14-22 dollars per hour in mid sized cities, while paramedics, depending on the size of the city in which they practice, ranging from 15-20 dollars per hour for their wage. Physicians of course will be compensated more fully for their time. Even the new graduate nurse can expect in this job market to be offered more than 12-13 dollars per hour when graduated from a school for licensed practical nurses, while Registered Nursing graduated generally begin their career with an hourly compensation of about 15-20 dollars hourly.
Benefits too will be dependent upon where you practice and in what capacity you serve as a medical employee. Medical employment fields, even those which require minimal training such as nursing assistant, typically offer excellent benefits packages, inclusive of medical, dental and eyeglass coverage, and in most cases, continuing education is picked up by the employer when you are involved in medical employment.
Medical Employment Opportunities
Medical employment opportunities are wide and vast. The shortage of medical employees and qualified medical practitioners has greatly enhanced the employment opportunities in medical employment. The shortage of health care workers is not limited to the United States alone, but does seem to be world wide in nature. The reasons for this are unclear, however it could be in part that in fact it takes a special kind of person to wish to spend a career in service to the ill or injured. Your medical employment could take place in a a nursing home, an emergency facility, in pre-hospital care, or in physicians office. You may also wish to enter into traveling nursing or doctors services, and research facilities employ a wide range of medical professionals. The best thing about medical employment is that there are NO typical jobs. The employment can range from clinics in the desert, to a floating oil rig in Alaska.
Medical employment fields today are in desperate need of quality employees to fill the wide range of openings. If you are considering a career in medicine of any variety, the medical employment possibilities are both endless and interesting. Your career security is virtually assured, and your medical career could take you anywhere.
