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What is the average age of nurses with 5 years of experience in the US?
Hello, thanks for your question about the average age of nurses with 5 years of experience in the US.
The short answer is that, Licensed Practical and Vocational Nurses who have 5 years in practice are on average 34 years old. Registered Nurses with the same years of experience are about 36.5 years old. Nurse Practitioners with the same job experience are 37 years old.
Please find a deep dive of my findings below.
METHODOLOGY
I started by looking for general statistics and demographics of the US nursing occupations, limiting my search to recent periods (i.e. 2014 till date). I gave priority to official governmental database, including the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN), Illinois Center for Nursing (ICN), Michigan Center for Nursing (MCN), New York State Education Department (NYSED), Health Resources & Services Administration (HRSA), etc.
I also consulted numerous reports and press releases by nonprofits, private sectors and education institutions, such as
American Association of Nurse Practitioners (AANP), University of Michigan, Charter College Nursing School, American Nurses Association (ANA), AMN Healthcare, and others.
Other resources that I have reviewed include news articles on American Journal of Nursing (AJN), HealthData.gov, VeryWell.com, Salary.com and PayScale.com.
FINDINGS
The three types of nurse occupations as defined by BLS are:
(1) Licensed Practical (LPNs) and Licensed Vocational Nurses (LVNs): They are supervised by Registered Nurses or doctors. In order to become LPNs or LVNs, one needs to study for one more year beyond high school and get a state license.
(2) Registered Nurses (RNs): They have broader nursing responsibilities comparing to LPNs and LVNs. RN's education may be a two-year associates degree, or a four-year bachelor's degree (BSRN or BSN). A national exam is required to be licensed as an RN.
(3) Nurse Anesthetists, Nurse Midwives, and Nurse Practitioners (NPs) (collectively known as "advanced practice registered nurses" or APRNs): They provide more specialized care. NPs are generally more educated as they have a master's degree in fields such as anesthesiology, cardiology, oncology, etc.
The 2015 National Nursing Workforce Study (the latest survey results by NCSBN) offers numerous age-wise statistics for each of those 3 types of nurses. In particular, the average age of RNs is 48.8 years (Page 8). For NPs, the average age is not calculated (Page 20). For LPNs/LVNs, the average age is 47.8 years (Page 26). You will also find the age distribution chart for each nurse occupation.
NURSE PRACTITIONERS (NPs)
According to the 2013-14 National Nurse Practitioner Practice Site Census by AANP (Table 1, Page 4), the mean age for NPs is 48.8 years; and the mean years of experience is 10.4 years. NPs ages 35 to 39 (or around 37) have an average of 5.1 years of experience. No further data breakdown is available so as to make any calculations.
The 2013-2014 study is the latest survey already, as AANP only conducts this survey every 2 or 3 years.
REGISTERED NURSES (RNs)
Since above data is for NPs only, I searched extensively for similar numbers for RNs but ended up with no tangible results.
Since NPs and RNs have the same mean age (of 48.8 years), my initial assumption was that, RNs of 35-to-39 years old would also have around 5 years of experience.
In the book "Professional Nursing: Concepts & Challenges," the author stated that: "Since 2005, the average age of graduates from all nursing programs has been 31 years old. BSN graduates, at an average age of 28 years old, are 5 years younger than graduates of associate-degree and diploma (hospital-based) programs, who are on average 33 years old."
The American Association of Colleges of Nursing reported that 89% of all new BSN graduates were employed in nursing between 4 and 6 months after graduation (page 4).
As mentioned above, BSN (as well as associate degree or diploma) are the requirements to become RNs. Thus, we can deduce that the average RNs with 5 years in nursing practice would be around 36.5 years old.
LICENSED PRACTICAL NURSES (LPNs) / LICENSED VOCATIONAL NURSES (LVNs)
Similarly to RNs, national LPNs/LVNs demographics by years of experience are not freely available to the public.
However, I was able to find some state-level data. The first study is for Ohio, titled "Ohio’s LPN Workforce 2014." Page 17 provides the median age of LPNs in Ohio by years of experience. Specifically, LPNs at 34 years old have about 2-5 years in practice, while LPNs at 39 years old have 6 to 10 years in practice.
Another report is for Illinois, named "Licensed Practical Nurse Workforce Survey Report 2015." Six diagrams on Page 7 present experiences for different age cohorts. Based on this data, I estimated the average years of experience as follows:
- Age cohort 26-34: 4.7 years
- Age cohort 35-44: 9.3 years
Results for Ohio and Illinois seem to agree with each other. We can safely conclude that the average age of LPNs with 5 years of experience would be 34 years old.
One way to double-check this figure is to leverage the differences in the number of years educated between LPNs and RNs. We knew that RNs typically attend a 4-year BSN program, while for LPNs it is a one-year program. If RNs with 5 years of experience are on average 36.5 years old, then LPNs with the same work experience should be around 33.5 years old.
CONCLUSION
To wrap it up, the average age of nurses with 5 years of job experience in the US are as follows:
- LPNs/LVNs: 34 years old
- RNs: 36.5 years old
- NPs: 37 years old
I hope this has answered your question. Thanks again for using Wonder! Please let us know if we can help with anything else!