Neonatal Critical Care Nurse

When it comes to caring for patients, Nurses deal with a little bit of everything. From flesh wounds to infections, from broken bones to organ failure, Critical Care Nurses know how to respond to a variety of acute conditions. A Neonatal Critical Care Nurse can take that specialty one step further by treating and caring for premature and critically ill newborns.

When you’re a Neonatal Critical Care Nurse, you may spend every single day treating patients, but the job offers plenty of variety and endless learning opportunities. Similar to adult care, the neonatal unit sees respiratory, cardiac, and diseased infants. As a Neonatal Critical Care Nurse, you also work with broken bones, surgical cases, and birth defects, so no two cases are the same.

Communication is a huge part of your job as a Neonatal Critical Care Nurse. Not only do you relay medical information to Doctors and other Nurses, but you also explain procedures and answer questions from patients and their families. Additionally, you use your writing skills to clearly record medications, conversations, symptoms, and treatments.

You make a great go-to person because you’re in the middle of all the action and you know what’s going on. You help with triage when a patient comes in, and are up to date with the newest treatments and technologies. You also understand how medications affect the tiny babies you work with.

As challenging and rewarding as this position is, it’s not for everyone. Some days can seem too difficult to bear, but the thought that you’re nurturing a critically fragile life back into existence keeps you going.