Four Ways To Improve Your Nursing Career

In a nursing rut? Here are four ways to feel excited about your future.

1.  Focus on your dream job. Cut to the chase. What aspects of your current job make you happy or sad? Now, stay on course with the ones that make you happy. Exactly why do they make you happy? Can you do more of those tasks and less of the others? Which leads into the next one...

2.  Get more education. It's not enough to have a nursing license, you must continually upgrade your skill set. So, take a course, go to a seminar, listen to a webinar. Just do something to help yourself.

3.  Take time for yourself. Everyday, do something for yourself. Whether that's reading a book, watching something on YouTube or working out. Reduce your stress level.

4.  Give of yourself. Give something back to nursing. Whether it's speaking at a high school to encourage students to become nurses or mentoring student nurses. We wouldn't be the professional nurses were are if it weren't for nursing.

You can do it! Try it!

Nurses: Two Steps To Improve Your Life Right Now

You've been a nurse for a period of time, however short or long it is. What can you do to take your life to the next level?  Here are two tested steps:

1.  Acquire more skills.  Whatever you like to do, learn how to do it better.  You work in the Intensive Care Unit, then get your CCRN certification.  You're a nurse practitioner, then learn the latest about the new medications.  Knowledge is power.

2.  Manage your career.  What does that mean?  If you want to move up the corporate ladder, you need to be a team player.  If you want to branch out and work for yourself, then you need to learn more about where you want to go before you attempt to get there.  Consider it a roadmap.  Would you set out to Australia without knowing the best way to get there?

Being a nurse is a privilege.  For that matter, having a job is a privilege so treat the job, and you, well. And, by the way, have fun at it.

Report Writing Made Easy for the Professional Legal Nurse Consultant

You've completed your review of the medical records, now comes the report. How can you make it thorough, yet understandable? Try these tips:

1.  Short and sweet. No attorney wants to read a dissertation about the med records. Headings in bold or underlined with a paragraph or two under each heading. Period.

2.  Conclusion is key. Be sure your report has your conclusion. That could be the most important part of the entire report.

3. One page, please. You could drone on and on in your report, but don't. Attorneys are busy people. They want your opinion in detail, but there are degrees of detail.

Follow 1, 2 and 3 are you're on your way to a winning report.

Testifying at a Nurse Expert Witness Deposition: Anticipate These Questions

You've decided to be a testifying nurse expert witness but you're unsure what you'll be asked. As a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant, you decided to increase your income by trying your hand at testifying.

First thing is first - you'll be sworn in. No matter what, you are there to tell the truth.

There are lots of questions you will, or may, be asked. Here are a few:

List all things, including documents and other items, you used to arrive at your expert opinion. This means you need to know exactly what the attorney provided to you and everything you reviewed, no matter where you got it from. An internet search, books and journals are sources you may have reviewed and must provide to counsel.

Your education, experience and qualifications. The best way to handle this question is to have a curriculum vitae that is up-to-date. Simply provide that to counsel and be prepared to answer questions about it.

Your opinions and the bases for each opinion. As a PLNC, you have reviewed the medical records and formed opinions. Carefully explain each opinion and how you arrived at each.

You can do it. You have the knowledge, the drive and, most importantly, you are a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant.

5 Ways To Increase Your Legal Nurse Practice

It's time to put into practice what you've been thinking about doing for awhile. Expand your Professional Legal Nurse Consultant (PLNC) practice. Here's five ways to do this:

1. Compile a list of fifty attorneys in your area. You want their name, email, address and phone. Send five personalized emails per day including all the PLNC services you can provide.

2. Call each attorney you emailed. For example, you'll send five emails today and tomorrow you'll follow up.

3. Mail each attorney a short letter. Brevity is important so use bullet points to list your PLNC services.

4. Write an article for the local bar association. This is your chance to shine. Tell the reader how you can help, citing your nursing experience and excitement for the job.

5. Get, or update, your Profile Listing on the Jurex Expert Directory. Be sure you add a photograph and post your resume at http://www.jurexnurse.com/about-expert-directory.

You're ready. Now begin.

To Negotiate Your PLNC Rate or Not? That Is The Question

Should you negotiate your hourly rate to review medical records? Consider these first: 1. You want the business; 2. You want the business; and 3. You want the business. So, the answer is clearly "Yes".

Now, how much should you reduce your hourly fee? You want the attorney to use your Professional Legal Nurse Consultant (PLNC) services again, so your interactions need to produce a win-win outcome. Start at $150/hour and realize you need to compromise. Does $125/hour sound good? $115? $100?

Caution: Do not go below $100/hour, if you can avoid it, because it becomes the floor, or ceiling, for your next interactions with this attorney. Plus, you want your PLNC services to viewed as valuable.

You Can Provide Lots of Professional Legal Nurse Consultant Services

As a Professional Legal Nurse Consultant (PLNC), you have lots of tools in your tool chest. Here are a few you should consider promoting:

1. Summarize medical records - so that it's easy for the attorney to understand what happened from a medical perspective. If you're services are being used, it's so you can explain the facts to the untrained individual. Keep your summary simple.

2. Interview witnesses - your opinion of potential witnesses can be extremely helpful. You bring to the table a different view. Offer to help by talking with witnesses.

3. Assist in demonstrative evidence - cases become more real with audio, video and props. Help the attorney come up with evidence that demonstrates a point in the case.

The list goes on and on. You are very valuable and remember that.