Registered Nursing Continuing Education
Continuing Education for Registered Nurses is very important for their future career – Introduction
Registered Nurses, also known by RNs, are the healthcare professionals who play essential and vital roles in the healthcare system as they are considered the basis of all processes occurred or related to the system. Licenced practical nurses [LPNs] and nursing assistants are supervised by RNs, as RNs are responsible for giving and assigning their duties according to the settings of the hospital. The importance of their work makes the nature of their working tasks special, as they may work in different circumstances and schedules like evening shifts or working on the weekends or maybe even on-call on other different cases.
Why Registered Nurses Are Important
The main duty of the Registered Nurse as a professional healthcare is to support and elevate health, prohibit illness and to help the sick and the injured people providing them the required cure at the exact time. They also have the required skills that make them capable of providing the emotional aid and support not only to patients but to their families as well. Patients’ historic care is provided by registered nurses to the medical physicians and other healthcare providers collaborated with them making a full healthcare team. They are also responsible for keeping records of the patients’ cases and notice the progress achieved, besides making their own nursing tasks.
Registered Nurses play an important part in providing the emotional support to their patients
Their duties also include supervising the licensed practical nurses and nursing aids. On the healthcare system, there are many types of nurses according to their specialty, exactly just like that there are many sorts of medical doctors. So, we can find registered nurses working in different places, like intensive care unit, critical care, cardiac nursing, forensic nursing, acute care, and many other specialties. Some registered nurses get additional training besides their basic education applied for the registered nursing career so that they can become Advanced Practice Registered Nurses [APRN]. With the continuing training and experience gained by the professional practice, registered nurses can reach to upper administrative positions like supervisors and directors with time.
The medical doctors do their work in discovering the diagnosis and describing the medications, but nurses do more efforts in taking care of patients and monitoring their cases and doing their healthcare needs 24 hours a day as they are supposed to be the link between doctors and patients and all these are done just to ensure a high-quality medical care to the patient.
Benefits of Continuing Education for Nurses
There is a wrong perception that the nurses time for education has been ended after the graduation from the nursing school and the continuing education for nurses isn’t put in its convenient place as an important thing for nurses needed to be completed. Nurses should look at the continuing education a little differently so that they can see its great importance in their nursing career.
Registered Nursing Continuing Education has a wide range of interests not only for nurses but for their patients as well. We will try to show some information that may explain some benefits of the CEU courses that may not be appeared in a good way to nurses who don’t care about it and its importance.
Keeping your Nursing License
The first tangible benefit for the CEU courses is that it helps you renewing your license as many states demand nurses completing a required number of hours in continuing education every year. The failure in completing the continuing education hours required means that the nurse may lose his or her nursing license.
Keeping Your Nursing Knowledge Up to Date
Healthcare system information has a constantly changing and the facts and values you knew in your nursing study might have changed. Therefore, it is important for you to complete your nursing continuing education courses so that you can get refreshed on what you already knew and stay up-to-date with new information found related to your nursing career.Keeping your nursing knowledge up to date helps in achieving best patients’ care
Nurses have considerably to update their knowledge in order to achieve the best care possible in their work. Continuing Education is the best way to achieve all these goals and you have to know that knowledge is the main factor of evaluating the experience between nurses working in the same places.
Being a Reliable Source of Information
You have to know that you often are asked questions about many specific and technical things by patients and their relatives and also by your nursing colleagues and you must have to answer them providing them with accurate and reliable information. You will seem to be unprofessional and untrusted nurse in case of providing them with wrong information and this may affect your future career.
Regulatory necessities are updated constantly and you have to be aware of these changes so that you can know the effect of them in your nursing practices. You also have to know that nursing assessments are changed and phased out and other assessments are found. So, it is a vital thing for you to be updated with assessments that relevant to your patients.
Getting a Boost in Pay
In many cases, the qualifications needed by the employers to hire new nurses may contain the education as a factor of evaluation. The standard requirements for jobs include a certain amount of nursing education, but in case of having extra educations in their specializations may lead to increase in the chance of the hiring and give the nurse a boost in his or her education category and this may be a factor in increasing the salary paid.
Nursing CE Topics Are Diverse
Nursing CEU subjects are varied and diverse and you may not know that you have the freedom in choosing courses in your preferred topics. There is wide range of topics that CEU courses cover and you will find subjects related to your daily practice. Patient Safety, Communication Skills for Nurses, Health and Safety of Occupation, Infection Control, Leadership, Avoiding Medical Errors and Regulatory are examples of the different types of continuing education courses that are provided to nurses.
Some other clinical courses are also found, like Pediatrics, Vascular Access, Pharmacology, Critical Care, Emergency, Maternal-Newborn, Transport, Medical-Surgical, Cardiology, Physical Assessment, and Pediatrics.
Providing the Best Evidence-Based Nursing Care
The knowledge gained by the nursing CEU courses is based on the evidence-based practice as it has been tried and set by others. This increases the quality assurance for the healthcare system because of the best possible nursing care provided by the information received that has already been done and proved in practice.
Being a Leader to Other Nurses
Continuing Education increases your skills to be a successful leader. Nursing continuing education courses can help you increase your skills to be a successful leader. New and better management strategies could be learned in managing your team and other skills of how to rise up the hierarchy in healthcare system could be gained.
This is useful information not only for you and your successful career but also for others in your team that may be inspired to improve their leadership skills by nursing CEU course.
Registered Nursing CEU Requirements
The guidelines for each state to renew the nursing license and confirm the continuing education courses are different from a state to another. Nurses who want to complete their continuing education, including registered nurses, should make a constantly check on the website of their state’s board of nursing in order to know the CEU number of hours needed to renew their license. Also, any changing in the nurse data saved on the board like the address must be notified to prevent any mistakes or problems may be happened in renewing the license.
California CEU Requirements For Registered Nurses
In the state of California, Registered Nurses are wanted by law to finish 30 hours of continuing education classes so that they can renew their license, besides paying the fee required. Registered nurses must complete the continuing education courses within the preceding renewal period, or within the preceding two years in case of the license of delinquent or lapsed case or license that is wanted to be active from an inactive case. The Board of Registered Nursing recognize the providers that provide the continuing education courses.
Georgia CEU Requirements for Registered Nurses
From January 31, 2016, all registered nurses worked in the state are required to complete continuing education courses as a condition to renew their license. In case of getting audited, registered nurses have to submit a documentation of completion according to the state requirements and then the nurses who submit a renewal application are chosen for making a renewal audit.
The incomplete audit requirements lead to have an incomplete renewal submission and thus may lead to stopping your registered nursing license. Registered nurses worked in Georgia must be notified that the Georgia Board of Nursing doesn’t approve any individual continuing education providers. So, you should determine first if the particular CEU course or program is accepted or not by the Georgia Board of Nursing.
Florida CEU Requirements for Registered Nurses
Florida Training Center is your way to Professional Continuing Education Online Courses
According to Florida Board of Nursing, registered nurses have to complete 24 hours of convenient continuing education courses within each renewal period. Prevention of Medical Error class of two-hours must have been included. Click here to know the details about the course of Medical Errors provided by FTC training center.
Besides the 24 hours required, every RN is required also to complete 2 hours CEU class of Domestic Violent every third renewal and this makes the total hours required are 26 hours. FTC training center provides the course and you can see more about the details here.
Every licensee is required also to complete a 2-hour course on Laws and Rules related to the practice of nursing in Florida from the beginning of the biennium that ended in 2015. Click here to know more details about the course of Laws and Rules for Nurses provided by FTC training center.
A 2-hour class on the subject of Human Trafficking will be a must to be provided to RNs from January 2, 2019. A course for Human Trafficking for Healthcare Professionals is also provided by FTC training center and you can get more information from here.
A new 2-hour CEU course about Recognizing Impairment in the Workplace is added to the state CEU requirements demanded from RNs from August 1, 2017. This course is also provided by the FTC training center and you can get more information from here.
Florida Training Center provides not only these new CEU course requirements, but more courses of different subjects are provided as well. Courses about HIV/Aids, Pharmacology for Nursing care, and HIPPA and Confidentiality for Medical Professionals and some other important courses for nursing continuing education for RNs are provided by FTC training center. Click here to see more.
Additional Important Information for Licensees in Florida
Registered nurses working in Florida who want to reactivate their licenses that are retired or inactivated will pay additional fees besides complying with the continuing education requirements. They should communicate with the Board of Nursing in Florida so that they can request their reactivation requirements. RNs who didn’t succeed in meeting these requirements have to reapply for licensure and also comply with rules and laws existed.
See also
Importance of CEU courses in improving your nursing career