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You may feel that, once you have your nursing license, you know what you need to be a
good nurse. And while that may be true overall, nursing CEUs are in place to benefit
you, as well as your patients. They make sure you're working to the best of your
ability, and that your knowledge and skills are up to date with healthcare standards
and advancements. It may be an inconvenience to take continuing education courses in
order to renew your nursing license, but in the long run, CEUs are a good tool for
nurses, and important to ensure the highest quality of care for patients.
They hold you accountable to healthcare standards
Once you get into the nursing field, you may find shortcuts or different ways of using
medical techniques that save you time. This doesn't mean you're not following rules or
endangering patients, but it means that you're not as careful to go "by the book" when
practicing and working with patients. Nursing CEUs will refresh you on techniques used
and help make sure you're sticking to healthcare standards when you work with patients.
They expand your skills and knowledge
To earn your nursing degree, you needed a specific set of skills and knowledge. However,
once you get into a specific nursing position, you may use a different set of skills
and knowledge based on what you do at work every day, and it's often more specialized
than what you learned in nursing school. Nursing CEUs give you the opportunity to learn
skills and techniques you may not know anything about, or gain knowledge about an area
that's new to you. You can then take that knowledge and those skills and apply them to
your nursing career. This makes you a stronger team member, and will ultimately benefit
the patients in your care.
They keep the healthcare industry up to date with medical advancements
The healthcare field is not all black and white. Yes, there are certain things that
don't change, but many times, medical advancements and different technology changes how
things are done for nurses. It's important for you to keep up with these advancements
since they're usually put in place to benefit you and your patients. Nursing CEUs will
teach you about these advancements, help you master new techniques, and learn why
they're being used in the healthcare field. Depending on the specific CEUs you're
required to take, this may be very new information to you, or it could be things you're
already using in your job every day. Either way, it's important for nurses to know
what's happening in the healthcare field, what advancements are being made, and where
medical technology is heading.
Whether you realize it or not, nursing CEUs are important to the healthcare field. They
help refresh your memory about how to be a nurse, they expand your skills and knowledge
as the medical field advances, and they ensure that you're keeping up with standard
healthcare practices. The continuing education courses you take not only benefit you as
a nurse, but will ultimately benefit your patients since everything you learn will
directly impact how they are cared for.
Workshops and seminars
Before you use a workshop or seminar to fulfill your requirement for nursing CEUs, be
sure to talk to your state licensing board to find out if they count. You don't want to
sign up for a seminar and find out later it won't meet your requirements. However, if
there are seminars and workshops available for your continuing education, this can be
a fun and interesting alternative to traditional courses at schools or in teaching
hospitals.
There are lots of options of where you can get credit for your nursing CEUs. From
colleges to nursing schools to hospitals and even workshops or seminars, these can all
give you the opportunity to fulfill your CEU requirements. All you have to do is talk
to the right people and make sure the courses count toward your continuing education
requirements, and you'll be well on your way to renewing your nursing license.
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