Traveling Nurse Jobs Offer a New Career
Holly grew up on a Midwestern dairy farm in the 1970s, learning a trade that had been in her family for generations. After high school, she decided she wanted to leave the family farm and enter the banking industry. For the next 20 years Holly worked her way up from teller to CSR to assistant branch manager. Things were going fairly well for this happily married mother of three until her world fell apart just a few years ago.
Unfortunately, Holly's employer ended up closing in early 2009. To make matters worse, her husband passed away after a prolonged battle with colon cancer. Holly was devastated. But after all the dust settled she realized she wasn't interested in returning to banking. The 14 months of caring for her cancer-stricken husband made her realize she was ready for a new career; a career in nursing.
After seeing to it that her three children were enrolled in college and on their way, Holly enrolled in a nursing program on the other side of the state. The ink had barely dried on her diploma when she was faced with half a dozen offers of employment. She eventually settled on a job at one of the hospitals in her hometown and went to work.
After a while, Holly began experiencing the urge to travel and she remembered some traveling nurse jobs she was offered. She took one of those jobs and has been a traveling nurse ever since.
Plenty of Opportunities
Holly's story is by no means unique. There are lots of men and women who have been laid off or, for whatever reason, just decide it's time for a career change. Nursing offers a unique opportunity to earn a good living while at the same time genuinely caring for other people. It's a career that allows workers to be concerned about people rather than just the bottom line. And where traveling nurse jobs are concerned, there's the added benefit of seeing new places and meeting new people.
Traveling nurse jobs are available in medical facilities all around the country, usually for contract periods of 3 to 6 months. These contracts become available when a local nurse must take a leave of absence for maternity leave, temporary disability, or other reasons. Rather than fill the position with a permanent full-time worker, or have to make do with leaving an empty, medical facilities are turning to traveling nurses to fill the opening.
Financial Rewards
Being a travel nurse doesn't mean you'll earn less. Staffing agencies pay traveling nurses as much as their stationary counterparts plus a standard line of benefits and housing and travel costs. In the end, traveling nurses often put more money in their pockets because they don't have the same expenses of maintaining a permanent residence.
So if you're undergoing a drastic life change like Holly, or if you simply want a new career, consider getting your training and taking a traveling nurse job. It's one with rewards well beyond just the financial.
