Many people may choose to enter the medical field as a Licensed Practical Nurse (LPN), which may also be deemed as a Licensed Vocational Nurse (LVN). This particular profession will yield tons of advantages to both the licensed practical nurse and the patients to whom they provide health care services. This is a relatively easy profession to get involved in, as an individual can get started after just a year's training. So, there is a relatively short training period after which you will begin to earn. Moreover, there are more jobs available due to the increases in demand for LPNs inside and outside of hospitals.
To become a LPN and get lucrative LPN jobs, an individual will take care of the injured, sick or disabled. They must be equipped with their caring, nurturing and sympathetic tools to provide effective heath care service as they will work under the supervision of physicians. They will also need to provide health care services for patients in a wide variety of ways, such as gathering personal data from patients, prepare and administer injections, collect all the laboratory samples and perform regular lab test, teach patients and others about healthy living concepts, and they will supervise nursing assistants.
These jobs yield high income, as a recent statistics report revealed that the average annual salary for LPNs in May 2006 was between $31,080 and $46,640. However, the wages for LPN jobs may vary depending on the industry. In hospitals, a survey showed that people employed in LPN jobs were earning about $35,000 annually, while at a doctor's desk, they were actually making about $32,710 annually. This is a reasonable salary as opposed to some medical jobs.
An LPN career seems to be a booming business, as in the year 2006 the number of individuals in LPN jobs ranged from 700,000 to 750,000. There have been predictions from the Bureau of Labor Statistics that this number will continue to grow over the next ten years by 14 percent to a whopping figure of 854,000 in the year 2016. This increase is estimated due to the fact that hospital health care demands remain strong, but it is also predicted that majority of the increase in the number of LPN jobs will come from the home and nursing health care facilities.
Another reason for the predicted rise in LPN jobs is the increasingly high demand by the aging generation of baby boomers. In addition to this there has been an increase in the regular demand for health care services, which continues to boost LPN jobs. Moreover, another contributing factor is the drastic advances in medical technology, which have resulted in patients now going to their physician's office or a nearby clinic facility to complete some procedures that were formerly done in hospitals. Licensed practical nurses continue to play a critical role in nurturing and caring for patients, who may be in dire need of health care services. Additionally, LPN jobs will also be offered in the patient's home, as many elderly are unable to visiting hospitals.