Whether you finished education with a high school diploma, a four-year college degree, or more degrees and certifications than you can list off in a reasonable timeframe, you are probably done with school. You might go into the job market, use your education to get a passion, and go through the routine of living the life of a worker with all the adventures and mishaps that come with it.
But what if one of the best ways to help your career was to go back to school and continue your education? It sounds crazy, right? Why would you want to go back to school and put yourself through the stress, tests, and bills that an advanced education comes with? Well, working on gaining advanced qualifications for your field, especially in the field of healthcare, can be extremely important for you.
There are a lot of positives to getting continued education, you could skyrocket past your competition and really change the world. Here are some of the reasons going back to school might seem like the best thing for you to do if you feel like there is more to learn.
School, and your field, are almost always changing
If you went to school several years ago for a degree in healthcare, when you return to that school to get higher education you might wonder if you went to a different place entirely. Any field you work in will be constantly adapting and responding to the world around it. New technologies, new methodology, alternate ways of thinking – changes and adaptations will emerge constantly in education, and in order to ensure high professional standards, it is important that you change with it.
For example, current students in the healthcare field are now required to learn about and operate increasingly sophisticated medical technology and new drug treatments. There are also many methodology-based changes which are altering how healthcare professionals perceive and treat patients and how they collaborate with colleagues. These are all changes which professionals already working in the field would benefit greatly from becoming familiar with, not only for the benefits it provides to patient wellbeing but also for the professional development of the practitioner, who will find these skills highly sought after.
You might be the best and the brightest employee in the old way of doing things, but if you don’t learn to adapt to the new ways, then you will find that your position is going to be taken by the students that have spent their entire education learning about and practicing newer, more highly desired skills and practices. Experience is of course incredibly valuable, but it is important to supplement experience with new learning.
So going back to school, or at least taking a few courses or classes to brush up on what is changing in your field, is going to ensure that you are at the top of the ladder in your field.
Learning shows initiative
One of the biggest issues that many people face after years in the same job, field, or position, is apathy. They’ve been doing the same thing for hundreds of hours over several months or years, and they’ve got it down pat. The exciting becomes mundane, and you start to get complacent. This kind of apathy can lead to poor performance, low job satisfaction, and overall low wellbeing. It can seriously affect your life. In order to maintain enthusiasm and commitment to your chosen career, it is important to keep yourself engaged and challenged. What better way to do this than by learning more about your subject and widening your scope of practice?
This is a very attractive trait for employers who want their workforce to be motivated. By taking the time to pursue higher education or getting advanced qualifications, you are telling people that you aren’t becoming stagnant but are instead trying to work hard and continue to push yourself and your knowledge to become better. This is something that will serve you well as you continue to grow, and it could gain attention from employers as well.
Growth can be hard to find in veterans of the field. Newcomers have something that they need to prove, and they are willing to learn and take on any challenge in order to prove it and get their seat at the table. However, the old guard will often have proven everything they need to prove and are willing to remain comfortable with what they have.
By choosing to take on an advanced degree not only will you learn more and more, but that growth will be noticed. Soon you will be keeping up with and even surpassing the newcomers to the field. Plus, you might even start to seek out more professional and personal opportunities to grow, and that is never a bad thing.
The advanced degrees will look good on your resume
Sometimes when it comes to resumes, the best qualified candidate will get the job, and if you want to make sure that you are the greatest, you need to have as many advanced degrees as you want to get. An MSN to DNP online program tells employers and others who are interested in you a few things about you and your personality. If you have a Doctor of Nursing Practice Program, that shows that you have put yourself through all the requirements of getting that degree, and you have shown that you have the skills needed to become a much better practicing nurse. Additionally, it shows that you take the act of nursing very seriously and that you are constantly improving your quality.
It also allows you to take on an advanced role in the world of nursing, mostly roles revolving around leadership and research. So, if you want to prove that you have the skills needed to become a leader, this is one of the degrees that will help you get there.
A MSN to DNP online program has you learn about new leadership skills that you will need in the field of care delivery, how to support good quality and ethical healthcare, and what the finances of a healthcare organization look like on a daily basis. So, you will know quite a bit whenever it comes to making decisions at the patient-focused levels, and you will be able to become a leader in the healthcare field with the most up-to-date knowledge.
Continued education doesn’t have to be a hassle
Let’s get something straight here as we talk about why these advanced degrees are so important: you don’t need to relive your school days in order to get them. Nor do you need to worry about how you are going to fit classes, tests, other student obligations, and more into your very busy nurse schedule, all while still somehow trying to have a personal life in between. Many of these courses can be taken online, with classes and tests done in your own time.
The people who have created these courses know exactly how stressful and busy the life of a practicing nurse can be, so they want to make sure that they teach you everything you need to know while also respecting your time and your various other obligations. No need to worry about late nights cramming for exams after a long day at the ER, so don’t be afraid to look at expanding your education, because it might take less time than you think!
New career paths and opportunities for specialization
If you want to work your way up from being a cog in the hospital or healthcare machine to being a leader, you need to have the skills of a DNP degree. Plenty of other career opportunities that will help you grow in the healthcare industry all have requirements that are much larger than a simple bachelor’s degree. But with any number of advanced degrees, you might be able to specialize your work as well, if you enjoy working in a specific niche or area, for example.
You might be able to take on courses or work hands-on in fields that are of interest to you because you have shown that you have mastered the basics, so don’t be afraid to get advanced degrees and certifications, and then see about narrowing your focus down to a niche you like.
How do advanced qualifications help your nursing skills in healthcare?
So you’ve decided to take the plunge and get an advanced degree, and you know why it will help and benefit you. But what about the patients that you are helping every single day, as well as the field of healthcare as a whole? How do they benefit from the advances in education that you have made?
Well, for starters if you know about all the new techniques, procedures, and methods for care that are being adopted by your field of healthcare, then you can not only recommend them to your patients, but you can also ensure that you are able to perform them and continue to provide the best possible care for your patients.
Additionally, with the education and the leadership in patient care that you can get with a Doctor of Nursing Practice, you can better advocate for your patients. If there is a healthcare policy that needs to be changed, you can work to make that change. You can also evaluate and advocate for certain outcomes for your patients, and you can use evidence-based practices to support new advances in the healthcare field.
The doors of healthcare are going to open up to you whenever you have these advanced qualifications, and they don’t take a lot of effort to get!
Increased desire to help patients
While you might think that getting these advanced degrees will only aid you and your search for success and recognition in the field of healthcare, getting these degrees will also ensure that your patients will receive the best quality care from you and your team. As you learn about all you can do as the leader of a team and as a leader in the healthcare field, you will find yourself motivated to continue your work and continue to support patients as best as you can.
This will lead to better patient outcomes, increased patient trust, and better communication with patients and healthcare professionals. This is something that isn’t talked about too much in the world of healthcare, but communication is always important. By having an advanced degree and advanced qualifications, you broaden the field of professionals that you can talk to with authority. Then you can use your communication skills to ensure that your patients get the best coordinated care.
The more you learn about healthcare and the better versed you are on industry trends, the stronger a positive impact you can make on the patients and their families that come to visit you.
Education can only benefit you and others
Hopefully any excuses you are still making about why you can’t go back to school or take a couple of courses online are starting to crumble, because getting a higher education has no downside. It doesn’t matter where you are in the field of healthcare; there is always more to learn and new ways to bring patient health to the forefront of everything you do.
So don’t be afraid to focus on your education, even if you just start out reading the news to see what new trends are coming up in the field of healthcare. You will benefit from it, and pretty soon you will also be able to grow your career as well.
