Chicago445

Hello fellow nurses! I have a BSN in nursing with 5 years clinical experience. I am in the process of returning to school (online program) to get a masters in Nurse Informatics, my first session begins January, 2016. I was doing some research on salary expectation and didn't find much information and the information I did find there were major salary gaps. For instance on one site they said master entry level informatics nurses make 50-60K while another said said 90-100K. I recently applied to a job at one of the top hospitals in Chicag, although my app was declined :-( I decided to email the nurse recruiter asking for all the helpful info she knows about NI. Not thinking she would give me the time of day she actually responded with a lot of good information. I've copied some of her response verbatim below.. "...In regards to salary, it is honestly going to depend on the institution, the area, equity, and the amount of experience you have. Education is extremely valuable and is something that will always make you stick out from other applicants. It definitely helps to increase your salary as well, however I usually see experience being weighted higher than education in similar roles. I would suggest to look into job postings around the Chicago area to see what the minimum requirements are. Generally positions like these will require a BSN but prefer an MSN, and there is a hard requirement on the amount of years of experience. If there is a hard requirement on experience, hiring managers will be a bit more lenient on an educational requirement or preference and vice versa. This will help you determine how much of a difference an MSN may make in salary. To give a bit more insight, at (deleted hospital name), we consider this a higher-level position, and the salary starts at $71,000 but we do ask for 7-10 years of clinical experience. We require a BSN but prefer an MSN so any candidate with an MSN is considered a priority. The average salary we see is around $90,000 - $100,000 yearly. We value both education and experience relatively equally however I will note the majority of our Informatics Nurses have already had their MSN or were enrolled at the time of hire. I am comfortable saying an Informatics Nurse with a Master's degree and minimal experience can start in the $70,000 - $80,000 yearly range. I feel $50,000 - $60,000 is a very low number and is closer in range to that of a newer staff nurse...." This information helped me a lot, it's hard finding info on this major so I hope this will help another fellow RN whose considering pursuing NI. God bless!