The title pretty much says it all. What happens to nurses when they become too old to haul around 300+ pound patients and do other nursing duties.
Is it the same for radiology technicians?
We become managers, healthcare administrators and work in homecare or urgent care clinics.
What @Lakemom said! Haha. Or where I work they go to Answer line. Out patient surgery clinics or gasp… School nursing. Haha.
I work in peds and they even make kids 300 pounds.
Academia, utilization review & case management.
When we get real old, we retire like everyone else and call it a career. Then, there is time to travel, catch up on our book reading, watch grandkids, etc.
Graduate school for admin degree/health information, health infomatics, nurse practitioner or clinical nurse specialist.
NPR had a very interesting story a couple months ago about extensive high-tech research that concluded NO one should be lifting heavy patients. The study found that there was no safe way to do it, and that even team-lifting causes high stress on certain parts of the body. The study concluded that there should be much greater use of mechanical lifts.
My RN sister moved onto doing intake/counseling work for the VA. There also is a strong market for nurse educators in nursing schools.
@charliesch I read that article. It was excellent. Similarly, there have been article on concussions with young people in football. What they found is that it is not a single concussion that is the problem. It is repeated small collisions to head that add up and cause the brain changes.
Lifting is the same thing. The repeated lifting by staff of patients leads to damage to their backs. I have no idea why in the 30 years I have been a nurse there is no change to the equipment to lift people. Patients are so much heavier now than when I worked, I cannot imagine how nurses do it.
So I am re-reading my last comment and I realize it sounded harsher than I intended. What I really mean to express is that it is important for new nurses to be aware of their bodies and how they move patients to protect yourselves. Don’t allow yourself to be pressured into moving someone who you really need help with.
RN/BSN here for 20 years. The beauty of nursing is you can stay in multiple bedside roles if your body can handle the daily grind OR you can transition into multiple roles that include managerial, nursing informatics, cardiac or pulmonary rehabilitation, nursing school faculty or go back to graduate school and become a nurse practitioner. I am a nurse practitioner now and am regularly contacted by recruiters (at least 4-6 times per week) for jobs in family practice or specialty offices. I worked CCU/ICU and ER for years and while I take great care to maintain my physical fitness and I loved my career, patients and coworkers…I spent days recovering from two 12 hr shifts in a row. Being an NP allows me to do the the parts of nursing I am passionate about (prevention/teaching, etc) without lifting, bending, etc. I love it !