So, do you want to go into nursing? Career-wise, you’re making a great choice. Nurses have an impressively high median salary and an amazing career outlook, with an expected 6% increase in field growth in the next 10 years. Not only is this line of work in high demand, it’s also a net positive on the world. Nurses are the backbone of all healthcare systems. Sure, doctors go through all that medical schooling in order to legally diagnose, and do the more complicated, specialized jobs, but the hospital would be absolutely nothing without its RNs (registered nurses).
Nurses are trained for more hands-on experience. They’re the gateway to every doctor's visit and the motor to every treatment, and there’s nowhere nurses are more important than in labor and delivery. L&D is a field carried by nurses. Exactly what an L&D nurse does varies from hospital to hospital and pregnancy to pregnancy. Some are the classic, highly trained midwives, who, in about 10% of hospital births, are delivering the babies themselves. Usually, this is done by an OB/GYN, who is an MD, but midwives have the ability to deliver as well.
Most L&D nurses, though, tend to work around childbirth, keeping new mothers and infants healthy. This is one of the most influential jobs in a hospital. These nurses make sure that the next generation is healthy and ready to enter life. In order to properly prepare yourself for this uplifting career path, you want to make sure you’re fully educated both in the principles of nursing and the specifics of labor and delivery. These are some of the best schools for you in that field.
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Right in the middle of Minneapolis, and just a skip away from St. Paul, lies the University of Minnesota. Visually, UMN Twin Cities is stunning, and gives off the exact vibe you’d want from a college. It has a beautiful brick-built feel that lets its ivy grow. On top of that, they also have an amazing nursing program.
UMN is specifically praised for its Midwife nursing specialty. They pride themselves on having a top-notch set of clinical placements in established midwifery practices. UMN also has a program in which they pair midwifery students from the nursing school up with their OB/GYN residents at the medical school to study and work together. If you’re looking to go into midwifery, the University of Minnesota is certainly an amazing place for it, cementing it as one of the best colleges for labor and delivery nurses.
Vanderbilt University
Nashville, Tennessee
One great place to gain your nursing skill is on Vanderbilt’s stunning campus, right in the heart of the music capital of the country. At Vanderbilt’s top of the line family nursing practitioner program, you can gain a ton of experience with patients of all ages. In addition to learning from some of the best family nursing professors in the country, if you already have two years of nursing experience you can come to Vanderbilt and study neonatal care. They also offer a nurse midwifery program—they really have their nursing bases covered! This is to be expected from the nation’s top ranked school for family nursing.
Of course, we don’t necessarily always stay in the exact program we expected to. Vanderbilt’s nursing program is great because they offer practically every nursing program under the sun. There are so many different branches of the nursing profession, so you should ask yourself a few questions before committing to a single path of nursing.
Duke University
Durham, North Carolina
Duke University is the classic answer to the question of the best colleges in the country. The Blue Devils’ home is so well-regarded for good reason. Their nursing school is top quality. This is made especially clear by this school’s distinction as a center of excellence by the National League for Nursing.
Where Duke really takes the cake, though, is in its simulation lab. This university’s nursing school has a lab in which students are able to get hands-on experience without having to pose any risk in a hospital environment. You can enter the workforce extremely prepared.
On top of that, Duke makes sure its nursing students are prepared for nursing globally. This can be especially important for midwifery, as that’s often a much more necessary role in countries with less developed healthcare systems. Duke will make sure you know all the necessary skills and languages to enter the world of natal nursing confidently.
These are some of the best colleges for labor and delivery nurses
Get a head start on life!
There are so many nursing programs out there, and they all offer a variety of different paths you can take on your journey to becoming a registered nurse. It’s always good to weigh all your options first, but plenty of people just really enjoy working with babies. If midwifery, delivery, and neonatal care are for you, you should definitely take a look into these schools and programs for your nursing degree.
