Are you an economy traveler?

When you travel to an assignment do you look for the least expensive options? Or do you look for comfort and convenience? I know that there are a vareity of ways to travel. Some travelers prefer to fly to an assignment and use public transportation to commute to work.

In some respects that is the most economical method as you don't have auto maintanence, gas, oil and wear & tear on your car to worry about. Unfortunately, I have never been much of one to rely on taxi or public transportation. So I have developed a method of traveling that suits my needs.

I have a little ford escort that gets great gas mileage. It's an awesome little car in many respects. Repair and maintainence costs are less than for a comparable import car such Toyota or Honda. Of course, it doesn't hold much stuff. I have solved the extra luggage issue quite handily however. as you can see from the picture :) The car top carrier gives me additional carrying capacity and I can take most of the bare essentials needed for an travel nurse assignment with me in one trip.

Comments and huzzahs are always cheerfully accepted. This is a moderated blog so I may take a short while before I give permission for your rasberry to show up. ;)

Your faithful traveler

Alphatraveler

www.the-travel-nurse.com

Cross Country Travel

I just finished driving from Washington DC to Washington State. Amazingly it only took 4 days. I came across the upper northern part of the country. Using a GPS device I fondly refer to as "Mother" I came through Pennsylvania, Indiana, Ohio, Illinios, Wisconsin, Michigan and North Dakota. I then drove through Montana, Idaho and Finally on into Washington State. According to mother the total mileage was about 2625 miles.

The trip was wonderful. I saw some awesome scenery. It looks like I will be traveling back to Washington DC next month for an assignment there again though. I have a really good offer that I am considering.

If you are traveling with children now is the time to be scoping out the school districts where your next traveling assignment might be. Unless you home school of course. If you are a home schooler you might want to check out some resources online for home schoolers.

The Home School Mom features a free newsletter, links to other homeschool resources and some free home school educational materials. May be worth a look

Home School Central features a new to home schooling page. They also have a state by state resources directory so you can find local stuff.

Travel Nurse Timeliness

Too long since I last posted here. Time flies when you are having fun. I have been busy working on my Masters Degree and at Walter Reed Medical Center. I spent a year there being a staff nurse, education coordinator and almost but not quite the assistant head nurse in the Intermediate Care Unit. The soldiers are awesome people who work hard at recovering. There just isn't enough that can be said about the men and women in our armed forces.

I have been working on a couple of really good sites that still need some work but they are good complements to the The Travel Nurse .

I have finally put the finishing touches to a site that details healthcare salaries for over 50 healthcare occupations. The site is called http://www.healthcaresalaryonline.com/ Did you know that a benefits package can be worth over $20,0000? see how a typical benefits package breaks down

A site that I am really proud of creating (yes, I feel there is more to be done) is called military-nurse.com. It's good site for those who are curious about the Military Nurse experience. I have also created a pretty good history of military nurses page that should be familiar to most nurses. A lot of the nurses who were pioneers in modern nursing were involved in military nursing as well. Florence Nightingale, Clara Barton and Dorothea Dix all had a part in modernizing military nursing

Some Fun Nursing Facts

National Nurses week which is celebrated the week of May 6th-12th annually co-incides with the birthday of Florence Nightingale. Florence Nightingale was born May 12th 1820. The idea of a nurses holiday was proposed in 1953 by Dorothy Sutherland of the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare. In 1974 President Nixon declared a National Nurses Week.

2.5 million - The number of Registered Nurses in the United States.

3.0 million - The number of Registered Nurses in the United States by the year 2012.

92% - The percentage of nurses who are women

600,000 - The number of licensed practical or licensed vocational nurses in the United States.

Largest Healthcare Profession in the U.S. - Nursing

7569 - Approximate number of hospitals in the United States.

1873 - First year a nursing degree was awarded in the U.S.

1846 - The first hospital training school for nurses is established in Germany.

25% - The percentage of Registered Nurses who work part time.

$28.71 - Mean hourly wage for Registered Nurses in the U.S.

Want to know what a travel nurse does?

Are Foreign Nurses the Answer to the Nursing Shortage in the USA?

Over the last few days and weeks I have received a number of interesting articles in my e-mail box proposing an interesting contradiction in viewpoints.

One of the viewpoints states that importing foreign nurses to solve the nursing shortage in the USA is causing nursing wages to be kept artificially low and discouraging qualified nurses from becoming instructors at nursing programs. The net effect is fewer nurses in the profession and lower wages overall for everyone. Foreign nurses are willing to work for lower wages for a variety of reasons. In many cases it's because they don't realize that prevailing wages are higher than they expect. Often, it's because the nurses fear asking for more money because of the perception that the employer will take steps to have them deported if they "rock the boat". According to one article over 30% of the nursing workforce are foreign born nurses. The call for higher wages is coming from a number of groups including nursing instructors and other health care advocates. One of the detrimental effects often cited as a reason to limit the number of foreign nurses we use in the USA is that it steals critical skills needed in the countries that these nurses come from.

The opposing viewpoint states that part of the solution to solving the nursing shortage should involve bringing in more nurses from foreign countries. These nurses are critically important to filling the empty nursing jobs advocates say. There are barriers that need to be overcome including language proficiency and making sure the nurses can meet the standards required to be licensed as a nurse in the USA. Advocates of increasing the number of foreign nurses point out the disturbing facts that nursing shortages are having a direct impact on patient care and potentially harming patients who don't receive adequate care or the right care because of the nursing shortage.

Issues are raised by both sides that are relevant and require answers. Are nurses who come from the Phillipines (0r other countries) the health care equivalent of 'sweatshop labor" forced into an economic slavery? How much harder is it to be a patient advocate if you live in fear of unemployment and deportation? Are we just being selfish when we take the best and the brightest nurses and bring them to the USA? What is the impact on the other countries? The world is in the midst of a global nursing shortage. Aren't we just making the problem worse when we "rob Paul to pay Peter"?

One thing this author knows for sure is this... In times of turmoil come opportunities. Travel Nursing is alive and well in these turbulent times.

If you are a nurse and you are curious about wages and benefits of nursing you really should check out healthcaresalaryonline.com

Until next time I remain your Travel Nurse commentator

Nursing as a Community

Nurses love to be part of a community. One of the places I used to work at was really great at fostering that sense of community. Sometimes we refer to it as being part of a “family”. It seemed like at least once a month we would have a potluck. I don’t know about you but I love potlucks. It’s better than going to a buffet restaurant because it’s like you get to choose from 15-20 homemade dishes all at once. Not to mention the desserts. While we ate we socialized, talked nursing and re-enforced the bonds that made us a community. But, how does a travel nurse who might have as many as 4 new assignments in a year keep that sense of community?

Enter the online community. Online communities have proliferated on the internet. For virtually every type of hobby or interest there is a community for that; including nursing and travel nursing. Online communities have a number of different styles. One of the most popular is the online bulletin board or forum. Nursing forums allow nurses to communicate on a personal and a professional level. With an online forum you can exchange recipes, talk about current events, discuss clinical practice and review work conditions in different areas. You can view comments made by your fellow nurses and respond to them. The nice thing about this is that you don’t have wait for your friends to be out of bed or off work to log in and visit.

Nursing forums can be very focused such as the forum for emergency nursing found on the nurserve.co.uk at http://www.nurserve.co.uk/newforum/forum_topics.asp?FID=1 or quite broad and appealing to the general nursing community such as the forums at allnurses.com or ultimatenurse.com.

There are also nursing blogs, e-zines and mailing lists where users post to the list and you can receive emails with everyone’s reply. These tend to get a bit of spam but nurses still do use them to communicate, encourage each other and provide the kind of support you would expect from a community.

Some travel nurse specific forums that I have found online include
http://www.nurse-forum.com/nursing-4-0.html
http://www.ultimatenurse.com/forum/f7/
http://allnurses.com/forums/f54/

Want to know how much a registered nurse makes in California?


Not sure about travel nursing? Check out my site The-Travel-Nurse.com and learn what Travel Nursing is about. You don't have to worry about being called 6 times by a travel agency recruiter because the site is not sponsored by an agency. It's written by a travel nurse for travel nurses.

Temporary Nurses Equal Quality Care

Detractors of using temporary or travel nurses have often cited lower quality of patient care as one of the outcomes of hiring temporary nurses. Yet, the truth is that the majority of temporary or travel nurses are highly qualified nurses who do deliver quality care. And now there is a study that says what all you travel nurses have known all along is the truth. "Temporary doesn't mean worse when it comes to nurses"

Its a short article in the The Star Ledger. They will ask you for a couple of bits of demographics such as your zip code and gender if you want to read the second page of the article but you don't have to register to read it.

Have you ever wondered how much employment benefits are worth? I have done a basic analysis and the value of medical, vacation and other benefits can be astonishing. Go ahead and click on the link to see what a typical nursing benefits package is worth.

Travel Nurse Resources

Occassionally, I run across a travel nurse resource or internet site that I feel should be shared with all my fellow travel nurses. One of those sites is a nursing magazine that focuses on the traveler. The last time I checked the magazine is free of charge to any nurse who wants to receive it. It's called Healthcare Traveler and you can read it online or even receive a regular magazine subscription in the mail.

Each month they feature stories about real travel nurses and some of the adventures they are having. This month features include an article about oreintation. Do they oreint travel nurses?Humor me folks ;) They also have a story about a nurse who is on assignment in Alaska. They feature clinical know how and other good topics.

I have received the magazine for a while now and throughly enjoy reading it.

Technology Friendly

That might be described as one of the key characteristics a travel nurse should have. On my web page about Travel Nursing I included a list of characteristics a travel nurse should have. I did not include Technology proficent or "techy friendly". Maybe I should have. Your average travel nurse can take anywhere from 1 to 4 new assignments in a year.

In addition to figuring out new routines, places to shop and more she or he will also have to jump right in and start using a new computer charting system, new IV pumps and different monitors than what was used at the last assignment. For the average person just adapting to a new computer charting system once can be quite traumatic. Imagine doing it 4 times in one year. Ouch!

There are those who love challenge and new things. They often buy the latest gadget when it first comes out. Travel nurses come in all sizes and shapes but I am betting that the majority of them are technology freindly and are willing to be beta testers and innovators.

Interesting Career Possibility

It seems that a popular career has started to become quite popular in Canada. The newborn night nanny. They actually call it a Night Nurse. Not everyone of them are registered nurses but many of them are. And the salary appears to be comparable with RN wages in other areas. Of course, the possibilities for this to be something that could be managed/arranged through a nursing agency are definitely there. The full article can be read here.

It's amazing what nurses can do to help people. The skill set we develop lends itself to so many incredible opportunities.

Until next time.... you can always reach me at alphatraveler@the-travel-nurse.com

Once again the looming nursing shortage is in the news. Depending on who is projecting the shortage we are A) already experiencing a nursing shortage B) Will experience the beginning of a much larger nursing shortage by 2010 or C) the Mega nursing shortage will be upon us by 2020. Why is there such a disparity in the data?

Partly because there are different factors being looked at. One thing we know is that the nursing shortage is not a universal "everyone, everywhere is suffering" type of shortage. There are significant regional differences that play into it. Salaries, population and even geographical factors contribute. More often these days almost all of the studies looking at nursing shortages agree that one of the significant factors is that schools of nursing cannot produce enough nurses. Shockingly, many nursing schools are turning away applicants because of a shortage of instructors and lack of adequate funding. Creating nurses is not very profitable for colleges so "surprise, surprise!" they don't expand the programs to meet the demand. But, just as importantly is the shortage of qualified instructors. Being a nursing instructor requires at least a Master's degree in Nursing and usually a pay cut for most nurses so it should be no surprise to anyone that nurses don't have much incentive to switch from clinical practice to teaching.

What this means for travel nursing is that opportunities should continue to grow for nurses interested in traveling. My site www.the-travel-nurse.com has details of how to become a travel nurse. The number of facilities and nursing areas that are recruiting agency nurses and travel nurses is pretty impressive. Don't expect to be able to travel easily if you want to be a diabetic educator (yet) but if you are an OR, Med/surg, ER or Critical Care nurse you would be amazed at how fast you can be traveling.

I just realized that I have been a bit absent from my travel nurse blog. What brought this to mind is that I am once again embarked on a travel assignment for the military. Of course, technically since I am an Army Reserve Nurse I am not a travel nurse but a mobilized soldier. But, as I start my assignment at Walter Reed Medical Center I am reminded of the many similarities. I have to travel away from home for an extended period. I have to arrange temporary housing (or have it arranged for me). The job is "temporary". I get to make new friends and integrate myself into a nursing team that I did not know last week. I will get to see a part of the country I haven't seen before. I am actually looking forward to booking some sightseeing tours of the Washington DC area. I get a "housing allowance" and "travel pay". Of course, none of this is intended to be a recruiting poster for the military. I just feel there are some obvious parallels between being a nurse in the military and being a travel nurse.

Until next time fellow travelers :)

Jesse aka alphatraveler@the-travel-nurse.com

Travel Nurses & Unions

Now there's a controversial topic ;)

Mention Nurses and Organized Labor in some circles and you just might get treated like the proverbial guest at a banquet who just vomited on the host. But, the topic is one that deserves a fair look. Recent news headlines linking a serious medical error (wrong surgical site) to temporary nurses hired during a strike highlight one of the facts about travel nursing. Some of our compatriots do accept assignments to hospitals that are involved in nursing strikes. And when that happens they are likely to get blamed for all sorts of things. Some of them are not fair or appropriate.

But, the question arises... and it is one that is central to the Nurses and Unions debate. "Should nurses accept assignments as temporary workers at a hospital that is on strike?"

One side of the argument says that it’s about patient care. Nurses who care about patients shouldn't be striking and if they wanted better working conditions there are better ways to achieve them.

Yes, says the other side...but what if patient care is jeopardized by a hospital administration that refuses to listen to nurses and won't consider any alternatives to the current way they are doing business? And when nurses don't support nurses it just allows the hospital to keep doing business as usual.

Opponents of temporary nurses say they weaken the nurse’s ability to bring hospital administration to the bargaining table. That nurses don't strike over issues like better wages as much as they strike over working conditions, patient safety and the right to have more say in the environment of care. Hospitals with high burnout rates and poor job satisfaction are more likely to find themselves in the midst of a strike and that temporary nurses help these "bad hospitals" to stay bad. One recent study even supports the argument that unions improve patient outcomes http://www.massnurses.org/News/2002/002004/study.htm

Those who support temporary nurses point to patient safety...who will take care of the patients when regular nurses walk off the job? They point out that if the strike is completely successful the resulting loss of income could be the figurative equivalent of "killing the goose" causing loss of jobs and income. Another point is that by filling in as temporary workers they assure that jobs will still be there for the permanent staff once the current dispute is over.

So, why do nurses decide to join unions? According to the SEIU (a union that represents nurses) there are a variety of reasons including safer staffing, higer wages, better benefits, a voice in hospital policies and political clout.

If unions are so much better then why don't nurses join them? Nurses don't join unions for a variety of reasons. Some believe that the Union vs. Management "struggle" creates an adversarial environment instead of a collaborative one. Others perceive the union as being “greedy and only there for the dues”. There is also a belief that nurses are a special group and that “petty issues” should not be allowed to interfere with the true calling of nurses – Patients. In fact, for many years it was believed that “professionals don’t go on strike”.

So, back to the question – Should nurses accept assignments as temporary workers in a strike situation? That, like so many complex issues in nursing, is really up to the individual nurse. I certainly won’t presume to dictate to my colleagues…after all that’s management’s job. ;)

This article ran in the most recent edition of The Travel Nurse Journal. The back issues are found at http://www.the-travel-nurse.com/TheTravelNurseJournal-backissues.html

Travel Nurse + PDA?

What do the words travel nurse and PDA have in common? They are both full of potential and portable. Whether you are talking about a Palm or a Pocket PC these small portable handheld computers have the ability to become a nurse's best friend. Or at least a fantastic resource. :)

Some examples of the resources you load onto your PDA include a complete medical dictionary, lab values, hemodynamic assessment tool, pulmonary assessment tool, ABG calculators, dosage calculators, PDR or Drug References and more. Of course, many of these resources are priced comparably to thier hard copy counter parts. But, did you know that there are many of these that are no cost? That's free to you and me! www.skyscape.com has a really cool program called archimedes which can calculate 70 medical formulas which is completely free. You can also find some programs at www.rnpalm.com or www.studentdoc.com .

It can take some digging to find the really useful free stuff but if you are on a budget and don't want to spend literally a couple thousand dollars putting every neat must have program on your PDA then you need to seriously consider doing the research and finding the freebies. :)

Some examples of what you can do with a PDA include using it to track tasks, meds and even charting notes. On a personal level you can use it to keep track of people including friends and supervisors, listen to music or watch movies and even check your e-mail. You can load map programs or use mapquest mobile and even use it as portable road atlas.

Jesse

aka alphatraveler@the-travel-nurse.com

Just an update on my traveling experiences. I have been "traveling" on the same assignment now for approximately a year and a half. Now there are some that could argue that being an Army Reserve nurse who has been deployed to Ft Bragg NC to be a nurse case manager is not exactly travel nursing. Ah...but I beg to differ. This is a temporary contract with option to renew :) I still maintain a permanent residence in Washington State.

My role is to assist Army Reserve and National Guard Soldiers to receive the right care in a timely manner while safeguarding my employers resources. If a soldier needs a referral to a neurosurgeon I am instrumental in getting it. I help coordinate care and assist with medical management. I follow my soldiers who have high blood pressure and make sure they are getting periodic blood pressure follow up as well as lab work. I also coordinate care and appointments for physical therapy, physical medicine, pyschiatric care, orthopedics, and much much more.

As is the norm for most nursing jobs I consider the whole soldier including issues like diet and fitness... which I counsel and teach a lot.

I have been to a few fun places. In May I went to Myrtle Beach NC with my wife and had a great time walking on the beach and looking for seashells she could take back to Washington with her. The view of the ocean is one that is just always impressive to me.

In June I went on a trip into the mountains of East Tennessee with one of my co-workers who live there in Elizabethton TN. Roan Mountain State Park is home to the largest naturally occurring garden of Rhodendrum in the world and is just a few miles form Elizabethton so we just had to go see that and Old Grandfather mountain. If you come at it from the right direction it looks just like an old man with a beard laying down.

That's one of the perks of being a travel nurse. You get to see and do things you never would have done if you were still working at the hospital just a few miles from home.

Until next time.. alphatraveler@the-travel-nurse.com

RV Travel Nursing

I work with a nurse who travels with his wife, two hyperactive
home schooled children and a poodle. The interesting thing is that he and his wife do travel nursing. They chose to create a consistent home environment by traveling with a travel trailer. An RV without the motor.

The living space is a bit small but they don't have to pack each time the assignment changes and the kids feel like home stays the same even when it moves. :)
They save money because usually an RV/Travel trailer space costs significantly less than an apartment and since most travel nurse agencies pay a housing allowance they get to pocket the difference.

 

Now recently the rising cost of gas has them thinking about changing things. They haven't really decided if owning a house or two in the two main areas they want to work in is practical.

 

There are some good sites on the net about RV traveling and its amazing how many travel nurses you can find who are RV travelers too.

Some things to consider when looking at an RV lifestyle:

 

Maintenance issues. If your water system breaks you fix it or hire someone to do it. :(

Higher travel costs related to lower gas mileage and increasing cost of gas

RV's are not speedy so plan on a little extra time when traveling

If you are not hooked up to a RV site with sewer drain you have to find somewhere to empty your tanks every few days.

 

Advantages:

You never have to rent a hotel room :)

You don't have to pack each time you change assignments

Cheaper than apartment or house rental

Pets can travel with you

Easier to travel with a spouse or significant other :)

 

If you have an RV story you want to share please feel free to add a comment to this post :)

Alphatraveler from www.the.travel.nurse.com

Refusing to Stay - Patient Abandonment?

Last time I posted I talked about nurses who refuse to perform treatments or give care that they feel is immoral or violates their personal values. This time I want to talk about another controversial practice.

I have talked to nurses from all over the U.S. who have very strong beliefs about patient abandonment. Many facilities use this to coerce nurses into staying past the end of the shift. Calling it patient abandonment they imply or state outright that they will report nurse’s who refuse to stay after their scheduled shift ends to the state nursing board. The implication is that not only are you abandoning patients but now you will be subject to disciplinary action against your nursing license if you leave.

The guilt of leaving patients in the lurch is bad enough but they also throw in the fear of losing your ability to practice nursing.

Well, guess what? Leaving when your shift is over is NOT patient abandonment! Read almost every single nursing practice act or the accompanying policy statement that virtually every nursing board has published on this topic and what you will discover is that this is NOT considered patient abandonment.

In fact, many states consider this practice to be nothing more than forced or mandatory overtime. The use of coercion and blackmail that goes with this practice is so prevalent that many states have passed legislation forbidding the use of forced or mandatory overtime as a routine way to cover shortages in nursing personnel. Maine, Pennsylvania and Washington states are just three of many states passing laws to prevent this shameless harassment and extortion.

What I find most astonishing is that there had to be a law passed. All it would have taken is enough nurses voting with their feet for employers to get the message. Sure it’s scary to tell the boss no. But, how hard is it to give two weeks notice and find another job?

Of course, the type of boss who feels they have the right to demand you leave your own family in the lurch or be terminated for refusing is just downright amazing. You expect that kind of hard-nosed callousness toward people from the military or other professions but not in healthcare.

In places where you don’t have a strong union contract or state law to protect you there are still employers who can and will terminate nurses who refuse to stay on after the shift ends. The real jerks will even threaten to “report you to the board of nursing”. I am not sure I would want to work for them anyway.

That’s where being a travel nurse can be very advantageous. You sign up for 13 weeks. Sure some employers may ask you to be willing to work at least 48 hours per week when you sign up but if you find that mandatory overtime is excessive and the attitude is draconian then when the contract ends it’s on to the next contract thank you very much.

Well, that’s my opinion for this time. I hope that all of the nurses reading this understand that I am not against staying past the end of my shift. I am against being forced to stay past the end of my shift.

Can Nurses Refuse to give care?

If you have ever served on an ethics committee or taken an ethics class this question will definitely have been asked and debated.

As a travel nurse can you refuse to give care or treatment? What are the implications if you do? If you accept a contract with a religious based hospital you may be surprised to find they have different ideas about end of life issues. Feeding tubes for example are not routinely stopped (often in defiance of health care directives from the patient) in Catholic based hospitals. The moral arguement is that life is sacred and only god can end life. The withdrawal of fluid and nutrition support is seen as actively causing death.

Courts have ruled that nurses have the right to refuse to give care which they feel violates thier personal values or religious views. The bad news is that courts have ruled that employers have the right to terminate you for doing so.

The crux of the matter seems to be in how you handle it and if the employer can or will assist with modifying your assignment so that another nurse can do the care. In a case where a nurse refused to administer dialysis on a patient who had coded multiple times (often while being dialyzed) and who was terminal the court ruled that because the nurse was the only one available to administer dialysis the employer was justified in terminating her.

Travel nurses are in a tricky situation because they have a very short time to impress the current employer and that employer passes on that evaluation to the travel company. Get too many bad reviews and the company will probably stop using you.

So, the next time you are looking at a contract one thing to keep in mind is if the philosphy of the organization is going to be in direct conflict with your personal values. Of course, it is usually only for 13 weeks and it's not as if you are going to be involved with the ethics committee.

And Happy Easter

Jesse Kesler

aka alphatraveler@the-travel-nurse.com

Registered Nurse Salaries are up again but are they real gains?

An article I just read shows that registered nurse salaries are on the rise again. Of course, this is after a period in which wages for nurses and healthcare workers in general were stagnant. A report published by the US Government in 2004 showed only a real gain of $360 per year for the last 25 years in nurse salaries. The report is called the 2004 National Survey of Registered Nurses.

The 2005 Earnings Survey has some interesting data; While wages are trending up for staff nurses in acute care settings they are staying relatively flat for administrative and management nurses Union nurses are making several dollars an hour more than non-union nurses. In fact the average registered nurse salary in a union hospital is $6100 more per year than in a non-union hospital. In regions with the lowest rate of unionization the wages are going up the least.

Full time nurse salaries are slightly lower than part time but part timers typically do not receive benefits. It's also noteworthy that full time nurses work an average of 45 hours per week while part timers only work an average of 26 hours per week.

One website I browsed recently suggests that nursing wages will have to go up by 69% by 2016 to cure the nursing shortage. The Department of Labor is predicting a need for over 600,000 new registered nurses by the year 2012.

To put it another way we have to grow the number of registered nurses in this country from approximately 2.2 million to approximately 2.9 million by the year 2012.

Obviously, if the rate of inflation is 4% then wages must increase more than 4% in order for a real gain to be realized. Since the government wants to downplay inflation a couple of key indicators are usually left out of the equation. Energy costs (think gasoline) and food costs. It was decided a number of years ago that these were too volatile so they were removed from the Consumer Price Index or CPI. The reality is that real inflation is probably more than 4%.

What all this means is that nurses are smart people. They know when they get a real pay raise or not.

The Benefits of Travel Nursing just got a little bit better

My Alma Mater, Favorite Nurses, sent me a notice that they are now matching funds in the 401k they operate for nurses who work for them. This is a welcome announcement. The trend for better benefits by travel agencies just goes to show that this is becoming a permanent job. While the assignments may vary in length the practice of working exclusively as a travel nurse is IMO growing. There are some obvious advantages to travel nursing. You can vote quickly with your feet if the place you are working is awful. A 13 week assignment is over before the nastiness can really ramp up. Not to mention some of the other travel nurse benefits such as paid housing, travel allowances, bonuses, 401k and medical plans that most travel nurse agencies are offering. Plus the ability to see parts of the country and enjoy such varied hobbies as hiking, camping, skiing and even theme parks. It would be awesome to do a 13 week assignment in Orlando Florida and spend at least 2-3 week-ends fully exploring Disney World.

The nursing shortage is helping to fuel this trend but I think that nurses are also getting smarter about the value of benefits. I have created a web page where I break down the value of benefits at my website The Travel Nurse.com. A conservative estimate places the value of benefits at around $20,000 per year for the average nurse. The evaluation is done for registered nurse benefits so it will vary a little if you are an LPN, LVN or other healthcare professional. But check it out at http://www.the-travel-nurse.com/salarybenefits.html