What I imagine my career as a nurse will be like

Claire has just finished her second year of student nursing. In this video she talks about where she wants her career to take her!

Hi everyone!

So those of you that don't know me my name is Claire Carmichael and I've just finished my second year as an adult student nurse. For an insight to what second year nursing is like, take a look at Chloe's video on her second year university experience.

Today I'm here to talk to you all about what I imagine my career as a nurse to be like when I finally qualify next year.

Fear and excitement

I just like to go through my two points with you to start with.

One is what my fear is going to be when I qualify and the second one is what I'm most excited about when I qualify.

So let's start with the fear, get it out of the way!

So my fear when I qualify is, because I've been a healthcare assistant for around 10 years overall now, I'm really worried that once I qualify it's gonna take me a bit longer to get out of that healthcare assistant role and into my qualified nurse job role and trying to think just that a little bit differently and trying to have that little bit more responsibility.

When I qualify I'm gonna have an amazing preceptorship, I'm gonna have amazing training to help me just get over that.

Secondly the exciting part is I'm really excited to get stuck in. I want to finally be autonomous and get stuck in, finally be out there in the fresh world of nursing and just learn!

Something that my mentors have always told me, everybody has told me this one thing - the real learning begins when you qualify.

What I want to do when I qualify

So when I qualify I would love to work in general practice and I also want to work within sexual health services, and they are two things that I'm hoping to link together because I'm really passionate about those things I'm at HCA in sexual health and I absolutely love it, so it would be really nice to get stuck in as a nurse doing that side of things.

But then the general practice nursing side of things I'm just so excited to do that when I qualify as a nurse.

I'm really looking forward to doing more training but I'm really looking forward to doing the extra courses and to top up my knowledge, do my updates, be able to understand what it's like to do a nurse revalidation for the NMC because I always hear about it but I don't know what what it's going to be like to actually be in that situation and I'm really excited to find out.

I can't wait to get stuck in.

So some of the courses that I want to do are the fundamentals of primary care because that's going to help me with my smear testing, baby vaccines, travel vaccines, the sort of things that you need specialised to general practice. I'm really excited to do that!

There's also a couple of extra courses - so I want to do nurse prescribing as well.

Yeah it's gonna be hard it's gonna be one of the hardest courses I imagine to get my head around because it's a medication, you need to know them inside out but I'm really excited to become a nurse prescriber and I think it's gonna help the doctors so so much.

I personally think, just my own opinion, that there should be a nurse prescriber everywhere, on every ward every setting, there should be one nurse prescriber because it would just take the weight off the doctors, so that is one of my goals.

One of my goals is to become a nurse prescriber and have that just that little bit more responsibility where I'm able to prescribe medications to patient without having to run to a doctor, wait for a prescription and just just to sort of create that smoother process for the patient and I think that's just gonna be amazing.

I'm really looking forward to that moment where the patient actually says ‘nurse?’ and it's like, do you know what that’s me! I’m finally a nurse, hello that’s me I'm coming!

I can't wait for that moment when my name is nurse Claire Carmichael. It's gonna be the proudest day of my life.

What I think my career will be like

So how do I envision my nursing career ahead of me?

So when I qualify like I said my fear I think it's going to be that tricky phase to start with, in that initial phase of settling in as a qualified nurse but I think once that fear is gone and I've got stuck in it's going to be amazing.

I am is so excited, I can't put into words how excited I am to qualify.

I've got 11 months left to qualify and I am counting down the days.

I can't wait!

I know that my journey ahead is going to be amazing, I know that being a nurse I'm going to be able to do so much more.

I'm gonna really be able to work autonomously and I'll be able to look after patients holistically.

I'm gonna make a difference to so many people's lives and not only that but the patients don't realise that they touch my life as well, they're gonna make my day I'm gonna make their day, I'm gonna hopefully save some lives, make them all feel better and I'm just I'm really looking forward to an amazing journey.

One of the things I've loved being a student nurse is especially towards the end of this second year on my last placement is my mentor taking a step back and allowing me to sort of take the reins a little bit more and working on my own, working on my initiative and I'm just really excited to actually be able to do that as a qualified nurse, to be able to work on my own, work on my initiative.

But at the same time I've got an amazing team around me who's going to support me and we're all gonna work together when we do struggle and that's going to be one of the best things ever I think.

And if I could describe my future nursing job in one word it would probably be rewarding, because I know it's gonna be so so rewarding, every single moment, and it will all be worth it.

Take a look at our student nurse survival guide, so you know what you can do to get through your degree before qualifying as a nurse!

Nursing is my vocation

On a final note with any career that you choose, whether it's nursing or whether it's something else, make sure it's a career that you are passionate about, something you truly love and get you motivated to get out of the bed in the morning.

You're going to spend most of your life at work, you're going to make so many bonds and friendships around you, your colleagues are going to become your friends and family but you need to make sure it's something you really enjoy and love doing.

Nursing is where my passion lies and I wouldn't change it for anything else.

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