Median Salary $71,730 Unemployment Rate 1.1% Number of Jobs 371,500

Registered nurses are responsible for monitoring a patient's condition, performing medical procedures and administering medicine. They also chart a patient's progress. These professionals work with a range of patients, from those who are healthy (and are proactively trying to stay that way), to those who are pregnant and bringing new life, to those who are nearing the end of life and hoping for a peaceful death.



"Nurses have a very holistic view of health and well-being, and I really appreciated that perspective," Erin Whitehouse, an RN and a Ph.D. student at Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, writes in an email. "[They] look at an entire person and their situation, not just what medical concern they have."



It's a philosophy that Florence Nightingale, the pioneer of modern nursing who lived more than a century ago, practiced, and her legacy lives on in hospitals, clinics and schools. Nightingale's concern for patients stretched beyond administering medication to caring for the whole person – physically as well as emotionally, intellectually and spiritually. And she backed up her nursing philosophies with research. Today, nursing research is just one of the exciting changes in the field, says Kathy McCauley, associate dean of academic programs at the University of Pennsylvania's School of Nursing. Increasingly, evidence-based science is confirming the contributions nurses make to patient care.



Many nurses specialize and work with patients who have a certain health condition, like cancer or diabetes. They can also specialize by body part. For instance, there are dermatology nurses and cardiovascular nurses, among others. RNs can also specialize by people group (like newborn babies) or by environment (like a school or hospital emergency room). The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects 12.1 percent employment growth for registered nurses between 2018 and 2028. In that period, an estimated 371,500 jobs should open up.