Enhanced Nurse Licensure Compact: A Big Step for Telehealth Nursing

With the growing scope of technology used by society, telenursing is fast becoming a need to be filled in healthcare. 

Telehealth nurses are proving to be a pivotal force in reducing hospital stays, improving quality of life, and lowering healthcare costs.

With the Enhanced Nurse Licensure Compact, or eNLC, an RN can provide patient care in other states that are part of the eNLC without being required to hold licenses in multiple states. 

Telemedicine jobs span from advising patients via phone or email communication to real-time monitoring of a patient’s vital signs. It is one of nursing’s most exciting fields, and the eNLC holds promise of increased growth and new opportunities.

What is the eNLC and How Does It Affect Telehealth Nurses?

The Nurse Licensure Compact was enacted to allow expansion of healthcare and to provide a uniform standard of care. Under this agreement, nurses were required to hold multiple licenses, depending on individual state requirements. 

With the eNLC, telehealth nurses who meet the requirements or are grandfathered in will be able to provide patient care without holding multiple licenses if the states they practice in participate in the eNLC.

With the explosion of telemedicine jobs, the eNLC offers much more freedom and opens the door for more nurses to participate in this new form of patient care. 

As more nurses look to telenursing for opportunities, standardized care is important to ensure quality patient care is provided. The eNLC is in place for that exact reason.

Telemedicine Jobs and You

If you think telenursing consists of sitting by a phone waiting for a patient to call, you are mistaken. The opportunities are countless and are growing by the day. 

Answering after-hours calls or fielding prescription requests are some of the jobs available, but also you can find a job in telehealth nursing in the following categories:

• Telephone triage
• Vitals/medical device monitoring
• Weekly patient check-in calls
• Prescription reminders/refills and coordinating doctor’s appointments
• Continuing patient care via email following a physician appointment
• Insurance medical verifications

The opportunities are expanding with the ever-changing state of healthcare, and with so many individuals suffering with comorbidities, this need will only increase. 

Telehealth Nursing Across the Nation

With much of the country looking for opportunities to work from home, telehealth nursing is making that a reality for some RNs. 

Many telemedicine jobs will need to remain based from a medical office or hospital facility due to concerns over patient privacy. One of the added benefits of this job is that you are still able to provide patient care, but you are not exposed to illnesses in the way you are in a person-to-person setting.

Telehealth nurses must be organized, disciplined, and excellent at communication. In a telemedicine job, you may be providing access to medical care to someone literally across the country. 

Telehealth nursing is being used in many regions, especially to reach those who do not have direct access to medical care or many choices related thereto.