I was doing some research on nursing last night and I came across an interesting trend.  Nurses today in the present-day are finding in taking temporary positions that enable them to travel across the United States to work as a nurse in multiple locations, or should say in different locations.  So for example if you are a nurse and you wanted to spend the winter in Miami, you could accept a position as a travel nurse and work in Miami for two or three months during the middle of winter.  These positions seem to be available all around the United States, and they offer outstanding pay rates and even benefits that are normally associated with full-time work such as a 401(k) plan.

This concept of travel nursing seems to have evolved and changed over the years quite a bit.  As we continue to dig within the book of medicine, we are repeatedly reminded that the book was written 90 years ago for an audience primarily consisting of mothers caring for their families and nurses in remote locations where other medical care was unavailable.  A single doctor might cover a single town or even a county or territory back then.  A traveling nurse back then might have to go by horseback to take care of an ailing patient, or they might work in a hospice or alms house typically for very low pay if they were paid anything at all.  Room and board were actually the standard pay of the time.

Fast-forward 90 years and the situation has changed dramatically.  Nursing is very high in demand to the extent that people will actually pay a nurse to travel across the country and work for a few months at a time.  Part of this is probably driven by the shortage of nurses and a number of different areas and part of it probably relates to the fact that elderly and ailing patients are much more mobile these days.  It has been very common for a couple decades now for people to travel south for the winter to Florida or Phoenix or even Southern California.  This influx of people that need medical attention seems to be matched by nurses that are willing to go to those locations and work.  Furthermore, were not necessarily talking about a live-in nurse that works 24 hours a day taking care of an elderly patient, were talking about a nurse that works a shift sometimes in a home sometimes a hospital or other medical facility.  That leaves pony of time for a real life after hours and many opportunities to explore the location that they’re visiting.