Neonatal Nursing Can Sometimes Be Heartbreaking

There are two factors you must consider if you are planning to have a career in neonatal nursing. Primarily, you have to be totally relaxed around children, especially newborn babies, and you must also be very dedicated. When you are working as a neonatal nurse, your expertise will be required mainly in looking after sick babies that have just been born.

A lot of people think that children's nursing is easy, in fact it is very stressful. As well as caring for the infant, you also have a responsibility towards the parents who will be very upset, all of which can cause heartbreak. The newborn babies that are under your care will probably be connected to a lot of wires, and inside an incubator, which can be extremely shocking to see, but you have to monitor them continuously.

In your job you will probably find that you become so involved in what you are doing, your own health suffers. Any chance to eat properly, or even take a moment out to relax will become a luxury. It is not uncommon for nurses that work with sick infants to suffer from stress. Quite a few even change their field of nursing, even though neonatal nursing offers so many rewards in other ways.

If you break down the word neonatal, you will find that it means new birth. In this form of nursing most of the children you will be caring for will be less than four weeks old. These first weeks of life are very important to their development, even though there appear to be very fragile. One of the most important aspects of the job is that you can cope with all the upsetting situations you may have to face.

The tasks of the neonatal nurse can be divided into three levels. The first is where your task is to care for healthy newborn babies where you do not have to worry very much about their physical condition. At this stage it is normal for the baby's mother to do your tasks once you have shown them what to do.

Another area is where you have to care for babies that have been born prematurely, and these need continually monitoring. Your primary task will be to make sure that they receive all their medication. This is one step away from the third area that you could be called into working, and that is the intensive care infant unit. In these units, careful monitoring of the infants and all the associated equipment is required. This is where you have to be totally vigilant as you are the one responsible for anything that happens to that baby.

This form of nursing involves dealing with very fragile human beings at a very important stage of their development. It is an extremely responsible job, and a career that should not be entered into lightly. You need to have a very large and caring heart to deal with all the emotions involved.

It is very important that you are not afraid of hard work, and are extremely patient when dealing with children, if you are to enter the profession of neonatal nursing. But, it is one job where you can be extremely passionate, and you will see the rewards of your labors. The love and appreciation you'll get from the infant, and their parents, can be a fantastic reward in itself.