Achieving a High-Impact Nursing Degree Without Sacrificing Employment or Time with Family

Nurses work long shifts, often over weekends and holidays. Their work is so important that it often takes precedence over quality-of-life considerations that are built into other careers. Emergencies can happen at any time which means that nurses always need to be on call.

Or do they? Nurses can improve their overall work-life balance by focusing on careers with more flexibility. While it’s not always possible to completely avoid sacrifice, a little bit of research and special effort can go a long way toward improving the balance of your schedule.

What is a High-Impact Nursing Degree?

Little secret? All nursing degrees are high-impact. At the undergraduate level, all nursing degrees are also the exact same. There are different ways to go about getting them. You could achieve your nursing degree online. You could do it in person. You could do it quickly—even so fast as 18 months with the right program—or you could do it slowly.

If you already have a degree you can even get in on the fun by enrolling in a certification-only program. This will allow you to pick up your credentials without going through all of the usual underclassman course requirements.

Alternatively, you can also look into getting an accelerated degree. This is also only an option for people who already have a college degree. Expect your accelerated program to be an almost full-time responsibility, condensing four years of school into an eighteen-month program.

How it happens isn’t really the important thing. What matters is that you will come out the other end with a BSN. This will allow you to take the NCLEX, which will allow you to then get licensed in your state.

In other words, the nursing degree you get will be both identical to that of your peers, and highly impactful.

What Does That Let Me Do?

The standard BSN will qualify you to work in a hospital setting. Maybe, it will allow you to work in a doctor’s office. Most people begin as floor nurses. Certainly, this career path is impactful. People who find themselves admitted to the hospital are there for a reason, and usually a very serious one.

As a floor nurse, you will be their primary point of contact with the healthcare system. Yes, they will have doctors and technicians in and out of their room—often at very impolite hours—but you will be the person they remember when they check out.

Impactful? Yes. But not necessarily balanced where work/life balance considerations are taken into account. Floor nurses work twelve-hour shifts. They do these shifts on weekends, and evenings, and holidays.

Let’s say you want to think beyond the hospital floor. What does that look like?

It Could Mean Going Back to School

Those willing to get their master’s degree have a clear path toward improved professional autonomy and (potential) freedom. With your master’s you can become a nurse practitioner.

NPs definitely work hard, but they generally have a bit more flexibility than floor nurses. As a nurse practitioner, you can continue working on the hospital floor, or you could potentially work in family medicine.

FNPs are very similar to general practitioners in what they are allowed to do in many states. Depending on your local regulations you may be able to write prescriptions, diagnose patients, and provide preventative consultations without oversite.

Depending on the level of freedom your state allows, this might mean having your own practice. Naturally, as a practice owner, you have whatever freedom you decide to give yourself.

If you don’t want to go the NP route, that is also understandable. In the next headings, we take a look at other nursing careers that are both impactful and a little bit more flexible.

Graduate degrees can be challenging. Probably you will need to balance them with your job and family responsibilities. Keep in mind that you can pursue your MSN online. This may provide a little extra flexibility.

School Nurse

School nurses do go to work every day, but they do it at institutions that are open from the choice hours of 8-3. With this schedule, you will be guaranteed to have the same days off as your kids. If you work at their school, you will even be able to drop them off and pick them up every day.

But is school nursing adequately impactful? Don’t they mostly just slap on bandaids? Not at all. Yes, it is the school nurse who gets the call about upset stomachs and playground scrapes. No, that might not be the work you went through nursing school to do.

However, that’s only the beginning of their responsibilities. School nurses serve as gatekeepers. They report large viral outbreaks to the state where they work to collect valuable data and potentially contain significant cases.

They are also often the first people to notice signs of abuse or neglect of a child. The work is certainly serious, but without the same life-or-death moments that happen at the hospital.

Bonus? Nurses, like teachers, don’t work holidays or summers. Talk about work-life balance.

Other Examples

Ok, so most other healthcare positions won’t have the same level of freedom as a school nurse experiences. You just can’t beat a nine-month schedule. However, you shouldn’t assume that every other healthcare job will have punishing hours either.

For one thing, many hospitals are working on expanding the freedom they provide their staff as a way of reducing turnover. Certainly, there are still challenges. It is difficult to establish an environment of considerable autonomy while also dealing with intense staffing shortages.

Still, nurses today are certainly occupying a more receptive and flexible employment environment than what was experienced by healthcare workers of the past.

There are other jobs to keep in mind as well. Positions that are important, but not so urgent as to require you to come in on weekends or evenings. Diabetes education. Informatics nursing. Cosmetic-related positions. Did you know that many laser hair removal specialists are certified nurses?

No, that’s not such an impactful career, or at least not in the way you thought when you enrolled in nursing school. It also doesn’t have to be the end of the road. If you are feeling overwhelmed by the demands of nursing, consider transitioning into a more balanced area of the work while you plan your next move. Too many people leave the profession entirely before weighing all of their options.

There are so many ways to be a nurse. Find the one that makes sense to you.