Telephone triage nursing is also known as phone triage nursing and involves providing support, consultations, and advice over the phone to customers, clients, and patients. Triage nurses enable hospitals and health care facilities to cut out the need for everyone to visit the emergency room when something is wrong.

A telephone is used by the nurse to figure out what type of care might be needed for the patient, and then refer this type of care to the patient and allow them to make the decision on going to their general practitioner over going to the emergency room. When it comes to wanting to be a telephone triage nurse, you want to ensure that you have the proper training through a qualified nursing education facility. Not only that, but with this education, you can land the nurse jobs in the field of your choice and get you the experience in the field that you need to move forward.

Average Salary

The average annual salary of a telephone triage nurse is around $42,000 to $50,000 depending on where the nurse is working, what type of experience they have, and the facility that they are working in. Every place and location pays differently depending on a few different factors which is why there is such a gap in pay rates. Not only does the telephone triage nurse get paid this amount, but they are also entitled to benefits through their employer most of the time. This allows the nurse to receive health insurance coverage, 401K plans, and even paid time off from work. These are all options that vary with the employer that the nurse chooses to go through and what exactly they give when it comes to benefits and raises.

Daily Routine

Telephone triage nursing allows the nurse to care for many different patients that can exceed the hospital or medical area’s resources. This is because decisions have to be made on which patient actually needs to be seen in the hospital, and which ones are fine to stay home and visit their general doctor the next day. The nurses working on the telephone use independent judgment, and protocols that can provide the best education for the patient possible right over the phone to every patient, of every age, with every kind and type of diagnosis. The patients that need the higher care are then sent to see the doctor in the emergency room, while others are told how to remedy their problem until they can see their general care doctor in the morning. The goal of having the triage phone nurses is to reduce the amount of unnecessary visits from patients to the emergency room by allowing them to know what the problem with their health may be through the phone instead of having them come in.

Work Environment

The telephone triage nurse might work in many different settings. One of the biggest places for a phone triage nurse to work is in an emergency room amongst other phone triage nurses. The other work environments can include call centers, clinics, and doctor’s offices after the offices have closed. The work environment is generally laid back and relaxed with minimal stress. There is normally more than one nurse that is working when it comes to phone triage nursing, and this means that the nurses have to work together with other coworkers while on the job. With the proper nursing education, the phone triage nurse will know exactly what to do with every patient that calls in, and lets them know what their problem is. This is because a phone triage nurse should be highly knowledgeable in the area of nursing and in the general medical field.

Education Requirements

To become a phone triage nurse, the person must have a registered nurses license in the state that they are practicing in. No type of certification is required. Continuing education might be required by some employers for their telephone triage nurses to allow them to brush up on their skills through nursing programs in their area. The general courses need to be taken for nursing, clinical should be completed, and licensing should be obtained through a qualified RN program.

Nursing is one of the largest growing fields for professions. Telephone triage nursing could be one of the biggest things to grow at the quickest rate because there is a demand for a lot of expertise in this type of nursing area. This will allow more patients to stay home, and get the help they need from a knowledgeable nurse in the future instead of having to constantly go to the emergency room or urgent care center.

Skills Needed

The nurse just has to be quick with thinking, providing the best answers using their knowledge, and able to sit for long periods of time while on the phone. The caseload varies, but there are regular work hours throughout the week. There is no face to face contact with any of the patients however, and you will spend a lot of time on the phone and never follow up with patients that you have contacted. This is something that might bother a lot of nurses since they might have joined the nurse field in order to have direct patient contact. Depending on what your wants are as a nurse, you might find this specialty of nursing enjoyable.

Telephone triage nursing might be the best specialty for you in the long run, and this is something worth looking into while going through your nursing program. You can learn even more than ever through it, and find out if this is the right type of nursing occupation for you to pursue. Ensure that you know more about the job, and find out all the information that is necessary to form a decision on whether or not you possess the skills needed to become a telephone triage nurse. There are many different resources available through the internet at any time.

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