The Job Outlook for Nursing Careers

Although the economy is sluggish, the job outlook for nursing careers still looks pretty good especially compared with many other careers that are experiencing hiring freezes at the moment. We will always need nurses, and even if hospitals are enacting some hiring freezes, travel nurses and other nursing positions are always going to be available. In fact, the Bureau of Labor Statistics foresees a much faster job growth for nurses compared to other careers through the year 2016.

It is expected that the employment of nurses will grow by more than approximately 20 percent over the next decade, and there is a variety of reasons for this. The elderly population continues to grow, technologies that require well-trained medical professionals continue to advance, older nurses continue to retire and patient care continues to progress. This expected growth will translate to more than half a million jobs for registered nurses if it plays out the way most experts think it will.

Although hospitals always need nurses, the most rapid growth for nursing careers can be found outside the traditional healthcare facility. The biggest growth of nursing jobs will be in home health care organizations, private physicians' offices and outpatient care centers. This does not seem to apply, however, to mental health and substance abuse care centers. Other areas of growth will be in employment services, particularly traveling nurse agencies, and in nursing homes for the elderly and disabled. There will also be job growth in hospitals.

Physicians' offices should experience the biggest growth due to the increased number of procedures being performed on an outpatient basis, which do not require any hospital stay. Home health care is a growing field because more and more elderly people are staying in their homes longer, opting for advanced home treatment rather than moving into nursing homes. It takes a specially trained nurse to administer the kind of care these elderly patients often need later in their lives. With such a good job outlook for nursing careers, it seems like as good a time as ever to get into this continuously growing field.