There are many opportunities for nursing students to work in health care while attending school. The advantages include earning extra money, gaining hands-on job experience, making valuable connections with managers and leaders in your field, and using skills you learned about in the classroom at the bedside. UAB Medicine supports you in these roles through a direct career path that’s easy to navigate after graduation as you transfer into an RN role.
There are several support positions for nursing students that provide the benefits mentioned above, along with flexible hours that allow you to be a successful working student. The information below explains a few of the positions that are a great fit for current nursing students.
Becoming a Patient Care Technician (PCT) at UAB Medicine is the perfect way to gain hands-on experience on multiple nursing units before you graduate nursing school. These direct patient care roles assume responsibility for certain technical aspects of inpatient care, as directed by the RN or LPN on the unit, and they work side by side with bedside nurses as part of a care team. Being a PCT at UAB Medicine allows you to show that you are empathetic and approachable, while demonstrating your commitment to health care standards and awareness of patient and personal safety.
Ways that PCTs provide direct patient care include:
- Assisting patients with everyday needs, including bathing, restroom/bedpan assistance, etc.
- Monitoring vital signs (temperature, pulse, blood pressure, respiration, weight, input and output)
- Performing EKGs
- Drawing blood and performing finger sticks
- Obtaining specimens for testing
- Helping nursing staff administer basic treatments
- Notifying nursing staff of any issues or concerns
- Keeping patient rooms clean and sanitized
- Ensuring that rooms have adequate patient care supplies
- Providing appropriate emotional support
Job requirements include being at least 18 years old and having a high school diploma or GED. Candidates must be able to work flexible hours and complete 120 hours of work every quarter or three months. CPR certification must be obtained within 30 days of employment. PCTs will be required to complete a specific orientation for their role.
If you have questions about this position, please email francesnbryant@uabmc.edu.
Why Nursing Students Enjoy the PCT Role at UAB Medicine
If you have completed your first year of nursing school or fundamental courses and currently are in your third or fourth semester, the Nursing Student Graduate Aide (NSGA) role is a great fit for your current nursing skill level. Our NSGAs play a similar role to that of our PCTs on the unit, but you will rotate throughout the hospital to help provide direct patient care as part of our interdisciplinary care teams. This is a great opportunity to increase your clinical experience in different nursing specialties, many of which are unique to UAB Medicine.
NSGAs perform PCT duties but also provide other forms of direct patient care, including:
- Changing dressings
- Administering nebulizer treatments
- Assessing patient care
- Caring for ostomies
- Inserting and removing Foley catheters with an RN
- Removing peripheral IVs
- Applying oxygen via nasal cannula
- Routine screenings and administering immunizations
Job requirements include being at least 18 years old and having a high school diploma or GED. Students must be enrolled in nursing school and in their third or fourth semester. Candidates must be able to work flexible hours and complete 120 hours of work per semester. CPR certification must be obtained within 30 days of employment. NSGAs will be required to complete a specific orientation for their role.
If you have questions about this position, please email francesnbryant@uabmc.edu.
Why Nursing Students Enjoy the NSGA Role at UAB Medicine
Working as a pharmacy technician is just a starting point for far-reaching health care career options. The UAB Department of Pharmacy offers a dynamic, diverse, and close-knit workplace where you can form positive relationships with colleagues. Teamwork is expected – and present – among pharmacists, technicians, nurses, physicians, and a host of other highly skilled health care professionals.
Our team works together to deliver safe and high-quality care, with each of us taking personal responsibility for identifying, resolving, and preventing drug-related problems in the patients we serve. You will develop a better understanding of the medications discussed in the classroom and prescribed to our patients, and you’ll interact with bedside nurses daily as part of UAB Medicine’s interdisciplinary care team structure. Pharmacy technicians assist in providing safe, timely, and compassionate patient care, and they work collaboratively with pharmacists and support them in their daily activities.
Pharmacy technicians provide indirect patient care in a variety of locations and ways, including:
- Central pharmacy location: Making IV fluids, preparing IV syringes and oral liquids, pulling medications for pending orders, managing inventory, filling the automated dispensing cabinets to meet patient needs, and packaging medications for unit doses
- Decentralized pharmacy location: Ensuring adequate IV fluids for patient requirements, maintaining inventory levels in satellite locations, recording the receipt of central pharmacy deliveries, and obtaining medications and delivering them to nursing units
- Ambulatory practice location: Assisting with medication compounding and dispensing, packaging and labeling prescriptions, and managing inventory
Job requirements include being at least 18 years old and having a high school diploma or GED. Candidates must be eligible for registration as a pharmacy technician or pharmacy intern/extern by the Alabama Board of Pharmacy (ALBOP), and active registration is required prior to the date of hire.
Learn more about our pharmacy technician positions.