For people who don’t work in healthcare, many seem to not know just how many different types of nurses and doctors there are. I mean, there’s over 100 different nursing specialties. Each of which has its individual workplace environments, demands, and pay rate. So when choosing which specialty is right for you, there’s a lot of things to consider. (But, let’s be real…salary plays a huge rule in making that decision.) Let’s dive into the top paying nursing specialties.
8 Top Paying Nursing Specialties
Certified Nurse Midwife
In order to be a midwife, you need addition school because it’s one of the “advanced practice” types of nursing. However, that extra schooling can really pay off–literally. The median salary is $92,229 for certified nurse-midwives. Their duties include guiding patients through low-risk pregnancies, giving check-ups,teaching them about prenatal care, and in some states even deliver babies solo! Better yet, the demand for these nurses are set to grow over 20% by 2018.
Critical Care Nurse
Working in the ICU can be a stressful undertaking. However, for critical care nurses, it’s just another day on the job. Plus, there’s a pretty decent amount of variety of settings that they can work in whether it be a nursing home, hospice, or hospital. The median salary for one of these nurses is $75,000 and it requires no additional training. However, you do have to have at least two years of working as an RN in a critical care unit before you become eligible to apply to take the critical care certification exam. Is this job here to stay? Heck yeah. In fact, the demand should increase through 2020 by about 26%.
Diabetes Nurse
Diabetes nurses help work with patients that (obviously) are diabetes sufferers. This specialty of nurse is perfect for people with an immense love of teaching because of the large need to provide fitness, nutrition, and overall health information to their patients. The average salary for nurses in diabetes specialty is $75,000 and the need for them is ever-growing as more and more Americans are being diagnosed with this disease. The profession could grow as much as 40% within the next few decades. How do you get started? Well first, you’ve got to work a minimum of 500 hours in a clinic or facility and also obtain a Master of Science. Only then you can apply for your Advanced Diabetes Management Certification.
Health Policy Nurse
This is one of the more unique top paying nursing specialties. Health Policy nurses don’t actually work with patients at facilities or hospitals. Instead, they work toward creating new policies towards creating a healthier society. For instance, they can work in a public agency, for congress, for a university, or in the legislature. How do you become a health policy nurse? A rough estimate for annual income in this nursing field is about $95,000. However, because of the wide variety of places they work, it could vary. You need to be an RN with both a bachelor’s and master’s in nursing plus complete a 10-week health policy residency. Having a doctorate is pretty common in this profession, too.
Medical-Surgical Nurse
Medical-surgical nursing is the largest specialty with about 17% of all nurses working in it. Their average salary is about $75,000. To become a medical-surgical nurse, you need to take a medical-surgical credentialing exam (and have 2000 hours of experience in the three years prior to taking it.) The outlook for this job? It is estimated to grow 30% through 2020.
Nurse Educator
Not sure if you wanted to be a teacher or a nurse? Why not be both! Depending on how much education and where you’re working, you can take home more than $84,000 a year as a nurse educator. In order to become one, you need at least a master’s degree. However, having a doctorate definitely has it’s advantages becomes better jobs come to those with more schooling under their belt.
Pain Management Nurse
Pain management nurses are like detectives on the case to what is making patients hurt and also to find out just what they need to do to make them feel better. In order to get a career in this field, you don’t need a fancy degree—but, you do need to have a lot of on the job experience in addition to your bachelor’s and RN license. In order to take your pain management certification exam, yu have to have worked a minimum of 2,000 hours. They can reportedly bring home an average of $78,000 a year.
Psychiatric Nurses
Nurses who work in the psychiatric specialty are Jack’s of many trades; therapy, mental health, and crisis intervention. There can be a wide array of types of patients to treat with problems anywhere from substance abuse, dementia, psychiatric or mood disorders. If you go to additional higher education you can become a psychiatric nurse practitioner where you can earn an average of $93,500 annually.
What top paying nursing specialties interest you the most? Browse our list of travel jobs and find the nurse specialty that best suits you!
