You’ll learn new skills that you can use no matter what you do in nursing.

The courses for your Bachelors Degree in Nursing will help you develop knowledge and skills in management which many hospitals and nursing homes require for promotion to head nurse or charge nurse. You will learn about theories in management, mediation and decision making. You will have a wide range of elective courses so that you can develop your expertise in various specialty areas. If you would prefer to write, manage, or work at a specific setting or with a particular population, the courses that you take on your way to a BSN will help you explore health issues in age, religion, ethics and government policy.

A Bachelors Degree in Nursing opens doors in many different areas.

A BSN opens doors in nursing beyond firsthand nursing care. Among the many career options that you will have available to you as a BSN are:

· Management Positions in nursing homes, hospitals and clinics, including Head Nurse and Charge Nurse positions. Staff nursing positions can keep you close to your patient care roots while giving you openings to advance into better paying positions with more responsibility.

· Community and Public Health nurses work directly with the public in a variety of settings. With a BSN, you’ll be qualified to manage staff and run small clinics under a doctor’s supervision. You may be able to find work as a nurse researcher with a team of community workers, or even help develop policy for community health standards.

· Independent Practice is another option for a nurse with a BSN, particularly one who specializes in home health care or midwifery. Work through temporary staffing agencies or out of your own office as a consultant with a BSN.

· Government Service in any field requires at least a Bachelors degree. Some of the government careers that are open to nurses with a BSN include military careers, the Public Health Service, Indian Health Service, the Veterans Administration, Peace Corp and Vista. You can work as a medical attaché in consulates around the world, or work toward a Masters Degree in public policy to help shape public ethics and medical policy in local, state or federal government.

Those are just a small subset of the various nursing positions that are open to nurses with a BSN. Others include working in the insurance industry, product management, research and public administration.

Nurses with an advanced degree earn more money

Even when nurses work in similar positions, BSNs earn more money than their non-degreed counterparts. A more compelling detail however, is that the degree opens the door to higher paying career opportunities in nearly every field. A nurse working in medical management can earn above $70,000, nearly $20,000 more than the mean salary for registered nurses.

A BSN is the stepping stone to a Masters Degree in Nursing.

If your intent is to become a nurse practitioner, a nurse midwife or a nurse anesthetist, you’ll need to continue your education further and get a Masters Degree in your chosen field. Those professions offer both more money and greater autonomy for a more satisfying career.

Tuition reimbursement and other tuition aids are readily available for advanced nurse degrees.

Nurses with a BSN are so valuable to an organization that many hospitals, clinics and other medical facilities offer tuition reimbursement and other tuition aid to registered nurses in their employ. There are more grants and scholarships available for registered nurses than there are in most other fields.

A Bachelors Degree in Nursing gives you more job security and portability.

As the medical field becomes more specialized, more and more nursing jobs require an advanced degree. In order to remain competitive, you need to advance your education beyond the standard continuing education that’s required to keep your job and your license. If you intend to advance in your career, a BSN is a must.

Many nursing schools now offer easy access to Bachelors Degree courses for Registered Nurses. The benefits available include online classes, shorter semesters and credit for your work experience. If you’re considering a degree in nursing, be sure to check into colleges that offer courses for working nurses and make it easier for you to gain your degree while continuing to work.

Licensed Practical Nurse, LPN Registered Nurse, RN Registered Psychiatric Nurse, RPN

In Canada all nursing professions are regulated in the public interest and you must pass a licensing exam to become registered in order to practice nursing as a career.

Nursing education for each of these types of nursing has common curricular components and some specialty components. However, the length of nursing education varies and each category has a defined scope of practice.

Licensed Practical Nurse

The Licensed Practical Nurse has 1-2 years of education in a community college or private post-secondary training institute. They have a limited nursing scope of practice that is completely contained within the scope of practice of a registered nurse and cannot work with clients who are complex or require multiple interventions.

In Ontario and some other provinces they are called a Registered Practical Nurse and this is abbreviated as RPN. This can be confusing because a registered psychiatric nurse is also abbreviated as RPN in the western provinces. In many provinces LPN’s were not fully utilized for many years and the numbers of nurses practicing as a licensed practical nurse declined dramatically. Because of the pressures exerted by fiscal restraint and by the nursing shortage which is quite acute, the licensed practical nurse is now in demand again in provinces where they can legally practice.

Registered Psychiatric Nursing

Schools that prepare nurses to enter psychiatric nursing are limited to the four western provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. There are over 5,000 Registered Psychiatric Nurses registered with the 4 regulatory authorities in these provinces.

Registered Psychiatric Nursing is not recognized as a separate type of nursing in the eastern provinces so that might be why they call practical nurses RPN’s (Registered Practical Nurses). This term cannot be used in the western provinces because it already used for psychiatric nurses.

The association of Registered Psychiatric Nurses of Canada recommends that the minimum requirement for initial registrants for entry to practice into the profession of psychiatric nursing should be a baccalaureate degree by the year 2012.

On the Registered Psychiatric Nurses Association of Canada website there are 7 education programs listed for psychiatric nursing in all of Canada. There is no legally recognized classification of Psychiatric Technician in Canada. You may see this as a one of the different types of nursing in other countries such as the United States but it is not a recognized type of nursing in Canada.

Registered Nursing

Of the three types of nursing, registered nursing (the RN) is the most common type. It is typically the registered nurse that people think of when they think of the nursing profession. Registered nursing has the broadest nursing scope of practice.

There are no hospital based schools of nursing in Canada. A university education is required. Some colleges have partnered with universities and students can enter a nursing program where the first two years are offered in the college setting and then complete the nursing degree at the university.

Most provinces have registered nurse education programs that are 4 years in length ( 8-9 semesters) but some provinces are now implementing a three year program (9 semesters) as an accelerated program in order to bring more nurses into the Canadian health care system more quickly.

One province in Canada (British Columbia) is responding to increased pressures on the Canadian health care system by broadening the scope of practice of the registered nurse to include some tasks that were previously out of scope.

When these new regulations are put in place, under certain circumstances the registered nurse will be able to provide a broader range of services than that provided by the current regulations including:

ordering ultrasound or X-ray diagnostics (in triage situations) conducting tuberculosis screening managing labor in hospital when the primary care provider is absent

These changes recognize the current education and skills of the registered nurse. However, the changes are specific to British Columbia as the nursing profession in Canada is regulated provincially. It is quite possible and quite likely however, that other provinces will follow suit.