Nursing Jobs at Disney World and Theme Parks: What You Need to Know
Career News October 11, 2013Disney World is the place where dreams come true, and for those registered nurses who land nursing jobs at Disney World, the park can fulfill their professional dreams. With competitive wages and excellent benefits, jobs in theme parks like Walt Disney World provide nurses with a new challenge almost every day, while providing a positive place to work. These jobs do require a skill set, but for the right nurses, theme parks can be a rewarding place to work.
The Need for Theme Park Nurses
Theme parks need nurses to help their guests with health complaints that come up while they are visiting the park. No theme park wants a guest to leave because they cut themselves or need simple medical attention, but no guest wants to ignore potentially serious complaints because they are afraid to leave the park and lose the money they spent on tickets. Clinics, like the six at Disney World, meet this need.
In addition, popular theme parks, especially the Disney theme parks, often have seriously ill visitors, like terminally ill children, who come to the park with foundations like the Make-A-Wish foundation.
These patients need access to medical care during their visits, and may also need a nurse to help them plan their trip around their limitations. Clinics staffed with nurses can meet this need and ensure that all guests have a positive experience in the parks.
The Job Specifics
A nurse in a theme park has a job that is a rare routine. Every day these nurses see patients and guests with a variety of health conditions. Sometimes, they will administer first aid to someone who has a cut or is dehydrated. Other times they will be dealing with serious health conditions, such as those terminally ill children who come through charity organizations.
Nurses who take nursing jobs at Disney World also work with guests who have physical limitations to help them plan their visit, allowing them to get the most out of their experience without going over their limits.
Job Requirements
Because of the variety of conditions theme park nurses will treat, they need a broad background, according to WorkingNurse.com. Some of the situations they will work with are semi-urgent, so triage or emergency room experience is helpful. They need to be skilled at viewing a patient and determining if that patient needs care beyond basic nursing care.
A patient who complains of chest pains or having an asthma attack, for example, may need emergency care at the hospital, and the nurse needs to be able to make that determination. An understanding of basic childhood illnesses can also be helpful, as children often fall ill while on vacation.
In addition, there are nursing jobs at Disney World for occupational health nurses. The parks employ thousands of employees, and they want to ensure that their employees remain healthy and uninjured.
Occupational health nurses will need to understand the difficulties of working in a theme park, and determine whether or not an employee can handle the physical demands of the job.
Pay for Nursing Jobs at Walt Disney World
According to WorkingNurse.com, the pay for registered nurses working at Walt Disney World is similar to that of registered nurses working hospital jobs. Benefits are also similar.
Nursing jobs in theme parks are never boring, and nurses benefit from not only using their professional training to help others, but also from helping people have the vacation of a lifetime, even with medical challenges. For those who want a different course of work but still want to use their nursing training, theme park jobs, like those at Disney World, are a good fit.
