SAMU Nurse Begins Postgraduate Program in Aesthetic Nursing in Paraná

The story below is different from anything you've read on this site. This health professional's choice of the Aesthetic Nursing course had several reasons behind it, such as the birth of her children and the search for a less intense routine. But that wasn't all!

The truth is that working in the SUS (Brazil's public health system) and at SAMU (Brazil's mobile emergency care service) was always an adrenaline rush that Maryellen Sprenger enjoyed having in her daily routine. And she intends to keep doing it for a long time, just without giving up her future. “Life is too short to always do the same thing”.

After her children were born, she began to see ambulance sirens in a different light. Seeking a lighter routine, she left SAMU and now wants more: “Aesthetics was to reinvent myself and do something new. I saw aesthetics as a path I could follow”.

Emergency and Urgent Care Nursing

The start of her academic career was difficult, as is normal in the life of someone who is only 17. So she began her nursing degree without being very sure of what she would find ahead. But, determined, she started classes anyway.

“I came to nursing through the influence of a friend. At the time, I didn't know which way to go. It's hard to choose a career at 17. I discovered the role of the nurse over the course of my degree. And I fell in love with nursing”.

Surprisingly, she says that today she can't see herself far from the profession. “I love being a nurse and I'm glad I made that choice. I'm very happy in my profession”. After graduating, she started working in the SUS (Unified Health System) and also at SAMU (Mobile Emergency Care Service).

In both, her specialty is focused on urgent and emergency care. “I like that adrenaline. If it were up to me, I would work my whole life because it's something I love”. But the birth of her children set off an alarm in this aesthetic nurse's life.

A Less Intense Nursing Routine

She says that after her children were born she began to weigh her work as a nurse. That is how the idea of Aesthetic Nursing began to come up. Not least because she never wanted to leave her job, but she began to see an emergency career in a more cautious way. “There are risks to being inside an ambulance, on a code 1”.

Code 1, or green code, is when care is prioritized. The patient needs fast medical attention, even though it is not urgent. So these are low-complexity cases that should be referred to a Basic Health Unit or an Urgent Care Unit.

And she adds: “When the ambulance runs a red light, you start thinking about your kids. And then what you think is that maybe it's time to have a safer job. So that's why I ended up leaving SAMU”.

The first step in this life change was swapping the ambulance and the first aid common in these mobile health units for a calmer routine. “Today I still work as a nurse, but outside the emergency service”.

Other Specializations in Nursing

With the breathing room she managed to create in her professional life, the aesthetic nurse believes she was able to look at her profession more calmly. ”I reached a point in life where I thought I could be doing something else. I even thought about getting a new degree”.

However, changing fields never seemed like the best idea. After all, she likes being a nurse. What she wanted was just to do new things, learn different procedures, among other challenges. And from that she began to look into nursing specializations.

“I like being in the health field and being a nurse. Even though I love nursing, I think life is too short to do just one thing. And I wanted to make use of the degree I already have. So I started researching other paths”.

That is how the idea of Aesthetic Nursing came about. That could be a path. “Aesthetics was to reinvent myself, do something new, learn and see that I have other options within my degree to work in”.

The Nurse's Passion for Aesthetics

Right in the first classes of the new specialization that Maryellen began, it was possible to see the career's many benefits. “A positive point of aesthetics is being with the patient, being able to look at them as a whole, in a different way beyond the health-disease process”.

The aesthetics market is very broad, and the nurse has already noticed that. “Each day you like something different. One day you want to work only with mesotherapy, the next only with the face. Suddenly you want to work only with laser. Because it's a very broad field”.

She says she found in Aesthetic Nursing what she was looking for: learning new processes to help patients. “When you invest in yourself, there is knowledge you never lose”.

Even at the beginning of the postgraduate program, she knows the end result she will have. “You can help the patient who comes to you because they have a problem or something bothering them. So you'll work on figuring out how to solve that problem”.

And no longer improving yourself is not an option. At first, she says she will balance the two jobs because she feels good in both settings. “Maybe further down the road I'll want to choose just one of the paths. But for now, I plan to keep both”.

Also read the story of Camille Mendes. She is a nurse, lives in the south of the country and also saw in aesthetics a way to specialize and have more autonomy in her profession.

Aesthetics for Other Nurses

You got to know Maryellen's story in this article. In short, she has two small children, works as a nurse and left her job at Samu a few months ago. Today, she is doing the Postgraduate Program in Aesthetic Nursing. And she manages to balance all of this.

“I manage to balance it well because the schedule of the aesthetic nursing specialization is not heavy. I can watch the classes and study at home. And I can do the hands-on practice flexibly. Also because I'm doing it with pleasure and it doesn't become a burden”.

She recommends the specialization in aesthetics, as well as other studies, to everyone who also thinks life is too short to always do the same thing. “Suddenly, you're changing fields and you discover that within your work there are other directions you can take”.

The aesthetic nurse leaves this message: “You can reinvent yourself, you can start your own business. Even for those on exhausting shifts, entrepreneurship is a way to have a somewhat calmer life”.

Success Stories>Aesthetic Nursing