What steps do you need to take to become a registered nurse?

Nurses do get to work closely with patients and doctors. Nurses can work in hospitals, outpatient settings, clinics, schools, health departments...there are many options! And, one of the best parts (in my opinion) is that you are not limited to working in the same setting or in the same nursing specialty for your entire career. You can continue to learn more and try new things within nursing as your desires, needs, and goals change.

Look and see if there are any opportunities to job shadow in nurse in your community. Shadowing is a great way to identify what the day-to-day realities of a job are.

If you decide to pursue nursing as a career, there are typically three paths: bachelors degree in nursing, associate's degree in nursing, or diploma from an accredited nursing school. The bachelor's degree will take the longest to obtain (typically three to four years), but it is also the strongest background to have for employment opportunities.

No matter what degree path you take, you must pass a national licensing exam before you can legally practice as an RN. It's called the National Council Licensure Examination for Registered Nurses (NCLEX-RN).

You can also check out the US Dept of Labor's website about RNs for some good information:
http://www.bls.gov/ooh/Healthcare/Registered-nurses.htm

Hello, becoming a RN takes a alot of patience, dedication, motivation, studying and determination. The first thing you need to do to become a RN is to take any prerequisite classes, this would include in science, math, english, writing and any other classes your school requires you to take. Some peolpe say to start off as a Certified Nurse Assistant (CNA) or a Licensed Vocational Nurse/Licensed Practical Nurse LVN/LPN before you go into becoming a RN. which would be good because they both do not require a lot of time in school and give you a little background on being a nurse. That will help you to start your career right away. You also want to see if there is a waiting list at the school you are considering attending because they will make it even harder to get into the program. Overall, nursing is a very rewarding career and there is nothing like being a lifesaver and changer .

Job shadowing is the best way to look at what the career entails. Looking at school requirements for nursing majors is also a good idea to get an idea of what kind of classes you will need to take (classes like biology, chemistry, statistics, microbiology, anatomy, physiology, etc.) but I believe shadowing a nurse at a hospital (since that is the environment a high percentage of nursing jobs are located in and where you would do nursing clinicals in school) would be the most beneficial to you along with possibly shadowing a nurse practitioner, nurse anesthetist, etc. You won't completely understand what is going on because you will not have gone to school to learn the ins and outs of the profession yet but you will get a good idea of the flow of the work environment and how stressful it may or may not be and if you enjoy each different type of nurse-patient interaction. Feel free to ask any questions and I would be happy to answer