Travel nursing isn’t for every person, yet it does feature benefits. Compared with long-term personnel nursing placements, traveling registered nurses take pleasure in even more adaptable agreements, chances for traveling and greater wages.
Travel registered nurses function temporary agreements, normally for a couple of months each time, anywhere there are staffing lacks around the united state This consists of health centers and long-lasting treatment centers, in addition to locations like prisons and jails.
Demand for traveling registered nurses was expanding prior to the pandemic, yet it took off in between 2020 and 2022, rising gross wages to as long as $6,000 each week,according to health-care staffing agency AceStack
While need has actually considering that decreased rather, traveling registered nurses can still make 30% to 50% greater than comparable long-term personnel registered nurse placements, particularly where need is highest possible.
Kevin Levu in your home.
Chuck Greenwood|Make It
The profession “provides a lot of freedom in my life,” claims Kevin Levu, 24, a traveling registered nurse at Pelican Bay, an optimal protection jail in Crescent City, California.
“For me, it’s the benefit of choosing how long I work somewhere, negotiating my pay and feeling like I’m being paid what I’m worth,” claims Levu.
Here’s a check out both the advantages and difficulties of being a traveling registered nurse, according to 3 signed up or accredited employment registered nurses that made the button.
The possibility to operate in brand-new locations: ‘I was inspired by journey’
The flexibility to take a trip throughout the united state is typically pointed out as one of the most significant benefits of being a traveling registered nurse. It’s what attracted Kirsten Newcomb to the setting. In March 2020, Newcomb, after that 33, transferred to the Hawaiian island of Maui after stopping her long time work as a personnel registered nurse inVirginia
“I was motivated mainly by adventure,” shetold Grow, the personal finance site published by in partnership with Acorns, in 2022. “I just knew if I was going to start travel nursing I wanted to go somewhere epic,” like Hawaii.Â
Kirsten Newcomb is from Virginia and has worked three travel nurse contracts in Maui.
Photo by Helen Zhao
Newcomb, who always “loved planning vacations,” had been considering travel nursing for a long time before finally seizing the opportunity to work in Maui in 2020, before the pandemic began.
Similarly for Levu, travel nursing was a way to “experience something outside of the norm.” While working with violent inmates is far from a vacation, he says the experience has given him perspective about his own sense of freedom.Â
“The beach is three minutes away from my house, but for some of these inmates it might as well be 1,000 miles away, because they’re never getting out,” says Levu.
Shorter contracts provide more flexibility
Travel nurse contracts usually only last a few months, making it logistically easy to take time off work between gigs. Contracts can often be extended, too, especially in places where travel nurses are in high demand.
That flexibility allows Aspen Tucker to work hard for nine months, followed by a three-month break.
At 26, Tucker left his staff nursing job in 2020 for his first travel nursing gig, attracted by the higher pay and the freedom to set his own schedule.
Aspen Tucker at home.
Nathanael Berry for Make It
With more time off, he’s been able to take extended vacations to far flung destinations like Belize, Colombia, Seychelles, Qatar and Kenya.
“When I was younger, I wrote down a list of places I always wanted to travel,” he says. “I try to knock out every place on that list.”
Newcomb has also taken weeks off between travel nursing gigs as a way to unwind. “I’ve been able to take more time off than I was as a staff nurse, for sure,” she says.
Travel nursing offers increased income
Travel nurses tend to earn more per hour than staff nurses. Plus, they usually receive tax-free bursaries or stipends to cover living expenses, which boosts their income even further.
While travel nurses could earn more than $6,000 per week between 2020 and 2022, they now bring in an average of $2,800 for a 48-hour week, according to AceStack That’s concerning $1,400 to $1,960 greater than routine personnel nursing placements.
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By changing to take a trip nursing, Newcomb increased her pay from concerning $1,000 each week to $7,000 each week in 2020, enabling her to conserve $30,000 throughout one year.
Likewise, Tucker greater than tripled his nursing income in 2022, which permitted him to conserve $57,000 for a deposit on a home in Spartanburg, South Carolina– an online for when he’s not functioning.
Levu increased his earnings from $56,600 in 2023 to $112,000 in 2024 when he began functioning as a traveling registered nurse at an area jail. The monetary protection that includes Levu’s work provides him a feeling of “relief” understanding there’s even more “breathing space” in his regular monthly budget plan, he claims.
The difficulties of the work take a psychological toll
While traveling nursing has monetary and way of life advantages, the work is not without its difficulties. Contracts frequent high-stress settings like jails, health centers and situation facilities that can take a psychological toll on those in the occupation.
Newcomb, that operated at a dilemma facility in Dallas throughout the pandemic in 2020, claims the experience was grueling. “I think I saw more patients pass away than I had in the full 10 years previous in my whole nursing career,” she claims.
For Levu, ending up being a traveling registered nurse implied leaving the regimen of a long-lasting treatment center for the rough strength of operating in a jail, where prisoner physical violence prevails.
“I have blood on my hands, and then later my shift ends,” Levu claims. In the outdoors, “people are greeting me at the grocery store, and I’m like, ‘Dude, this feels a little unreal.'”
The hours can be long, also. Tucker has the ability to require time off when he requires it, yet when on agreement he has actually functioned 48- to 60-hour weeks to optimize his overtime pay.
Life when traveling includes compromises
In enhancement to the psychological toll, traveling nursing includes logistical compromises also.
In Newcomb’s situation, in spite of having the ability to “swim with turtles” on an exotic island, the high price of living in Maui stopped her from conserving much cash when she existed. And with each work comes the difficulty of discovering a brand-new area to remain, normally within 2 weeks of approving a deal.
The logistics of traveling can be “very stressful,” she claims.
Kirsten Newcomb in Hawaii.
Photo by Helen Zhao
The included traveling prices can likewise be challenging to take care of, claimsTucker When functioning, he’s needed to pay rental fee while still making home loan settlements back home. He’s likewise needed to pay buddies to deal with his family pet canine and watch on his home.
By not having an irreversible work, Tucker likewise does not have medical insurance when he’s not functioning. He needs to take care concerning health-care prices when he’s been in between agreements, he claims.
The apparent difficulty for Levu is the risk of physical violence atPelican Bay For that factor, “corrections isn’t something I plan on doing on a long-term basis,” he claims. Instead, he may sign up with the military as an appointed registered nurse.
In the meanwhile, Levu is discovering to stabilize the tension of his deal with his psychological health and wellness. That implies not constantly grabbing overtime, simply to make even more cash: “If it’s something I enjoy doing, then I will,” he claims. “Otherwise, I don’t necessarily need the money that bad.”
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