So you think you want to start travel nursing? YOU SHOULD!!! Travel nursing offers so many amazing benefits–seeing the country while getting paid a metric shit ton (compared to permanent positions), the rare opportunity to experience SO many different types of management/patients/trauma situations (heart attacks and strokes are pretty run of the mill no matter where you go) and give you an opportunity to reinvent yourself as a professional OVER and over again. It’s unlike anything else.

Travel nursing can be SUPER intimidating at first–you REALLY have to know your stuff or you can feel lost and overwhelmed. Most travel places want you to have several years of experience under your belt before you start, especially in more volatile areas like the emergency department. (Beware of travel assignments that will take someone with only 1 year of ED experience…there are plenty of seasoned travel nurses out there, why can’t they get one of them to take this position? Always stay vigilant and ask questions.) Some of the best advice I have ever received is this: when you understand WHY you are doing the interventions at hand instead of just simply knowing it needs to be done, you can be a nurse in any setting with any patient. [And you’re ready to travel nurse!] All potentially septic patients need a baseline lactic acid drawn, right? But WHY? Why should trauma patients also have a baseline lactic acid level drawn? If you only know that this needs to be done because it’s part of the protocol, do some studying! Revisit you Trauma Nurse Core Curriculum book (or if you’re in Illinois, your Trauma Nurse Specialist book), ask a coworker [a more experienced nurse, mid-level or physician…all have unique perspectives and information to offer!] or sign up for some continuing education classes. You’re never going to know everything and you’ll likely never feel like you know enough to be truly ready, but if you’ve got the “why” down, let’s get you traveling!!

I was a travel nurse for about 1 year and gained SO MUCH knowledge and grew exponentially as a registered nurse. I had an amazing 6 month assignment at the University of Iowa in Iowa City followed by a complete nightmare 3 month assignment at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston with a 1 month break in between assignments. Unfortunately, my plan to continue travel nursing was cut short by my moms deteriorating health (more on that in a future post), but I hope to find my way back to travel nursing one day.

There is literally SO MUCH to know about travel nursing before you even start to think about where you want to go for your first assignment! So lets start here: Once you’ve decided that you want to pursue travel nursing, your first step will be to find a company/recruiter that 1. you trust and 2. holds good contracts in the areas you think you’d like to travel. The best way to find this is through recommendations from other travel nurses, preferably ones you know personally. There are many Facebook groups that exist for “exclusive contracts”–BEWARE: a lot of these contracts are too good to be true and you are getting scammed. I don’t recommend choosing your recruiter from these sites-they’re overly aggressive and often misleading. Personally, I am signed up fully with 2 travel nurse companies for the sole reason that it gives me more location options than I would have with just 1 recruiter. I wouldn’t recommend signing up with more than 2 companies though. My awesome companies are Medical Solutions (recruiter: Lindsay Thomas) and American Mobile Nursing (recruiter: Killian Serrano).

Once you’ve made contact with your recruiter, you will be filling out paperwork until the rapture. You’ll also be subject to a background check, urine drug screen, a physical (it’s seriously laughable– can you maintain consciousness throughout the shift? PERFECT! You pass.), and will be required to locate paperwork you completely forgot to keep close tabs on over the years (Immunization records, certifications, etc.). You will also likely fill out a skills checklist pertaining specifically to your nursing specialty. I’m not telling you to lie per se, but just mark the highest score for yourself and move your day right along! Some companies even make you do a proctored exam for EKG interpretation which can be a bit difficult but you’ll get through it.

Now that you’re all signed up and your paperwork is turned in, it’s time to find an assignment that appeals to you! Here’s the part where you really need to dig deep and ask yourself:

What is my priority in travel nursing?
*Is it location specific? (I really want to go to the northeast!)
*Is it hospital specific? (I really want Mass General on my resume!)
*Is it income specific? (I’ll go where ever will pay me the most!)

With area specific and hospital specific motivation, you have to consider:
*Are you already licensed here? Is the position in a compact state?
*Time of the year and weather considerations for the activities you
want to experience while there
*Cost of living vs expected income
*Ease of transportation to/from the hospital (Bigger cities will likely require more time/effort to get around.)
*Safety of the surrounding area
*Size of the hospital and who the clientele would likely be

With income specific priorities, you still need to consider:
*If a contract is paying crazy high amounts, there is likely a reason for it. Is it in a high crime area? Is it at a poorly ranked hospital? Are the patient to staff ratios ridiculous? Is it in Boston in the middle of winter or Memphis in the middle of summer? ASK QUESTIONS!!

As soon as you find a position posted or your recruiter provides you with other options not posted online that you desire, it is time for your recruiter to submit your application and hope for a phone interview request! Ohh yeah, that’s the other thing…you still have to do an interview. And each position will have a start date listed. These start dates are mildly negotiable but they tend to stick pretty strongly to them so it’s a little bit of schedule Tetris sometimes, especially if you are going from one assignment to the next. Additionally, I highly recommend practicing your interview skills regularly. It’s a good idea to write out answers to the most commonly asked interview questions so you can refer to it during interviews. The interviewer will then get a hold of your recruiter with a yes or no; if the offer is a go, a contract will be sent. Make sure it includes all the necessary information to personalize it to you and your expectations.

Travel nurses are in high demand, but not to the point [any more] where you can pick any city in the US and easily find a contract with the right pay, right start date, etc. It’s a bit more competitive and complex than that. HAVE OPTIONS! Try not to get pigeon-holed into one specific assignment; keep an open mind and you might find yourself somewhere you never expected having the best assignment of your career.

Happy travels <3