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Technicians and associate professionals · code 3221

Nursing associate professionals

AI can update the patient record. It can't dress the wound.

Updating patient records is the one task AI could take a fair chunk of. It barely touches four of the six, including emergency first aid and dressing wounds.

What they actually do (and what else they get called)

Nursing associate professionals provide basic nursing and personal care for people in need of such care due to effects of ageing, illness, injury, or other physical or mental impairment. They generally work under the supervision of, and in support of, implementation of health care, treatment and referrals plans established by medical, nursing and other health professionals. Tasks include - (a) providing nursing and personal care and treatment and health advice to patients according to care plans established by health professionals; (b) administering medications and other treatments to patients, monitoring patients’ condition and responses to treatment, and referring patients and their families to a health professional for specialized care as needed; (c) cleaning wounds and applying surgical dressings; (d) updating information on patients’ condition and treatments received in record-keeping systems; (e) assisting in planning and managing the care of individual patients; (f) assisting in giving first-aid treatment in emergencies. Examples of the occupations classified here: - Assistant nurse - Associate professional nurse - Enrolled nurse - Practical nurse Some related occupations classified elsewhere: - Clinical nurse consultant - 2221 - Professional nurse - 2221 - Specialist nurse - 2221 - Professional midwife - 2222 - Associate professional midwife - 3222 - Nursing aide (clinic or hospital) - 5321 - Nursing aide (home) - 5322 Note The distinction between professional and associate professional nurses should be made on the basis of the nature of the work performed in relation to the tasks specified in this definition. The qualifications held by individuals or that predominate in the country are not the main factor in making this distinction, as training arrangements for nurses vary widely between countries and have varied over time within countries.

78 / 100

Mostly holds up against AI

AI can take a few chores off your plate, but most of the day is still yours.

Not the odds you keep your job. It's how much of the everyday work still needs a person, out of 100.

← Robot's turf Human's turf →

The ILO's official verdict: Minimal Exposure

165 of 427 for holding up against AI

Why this score?

The ILO rated each of this job's 6 tasks for how much of it AI could do. They average 21.7 out of 100, so it holds up at 100 − 21.7 = 78.3.

That's the whole sum. No black box, no secret sauce: you can check it against the ILO's study. ILO group “Minimal Exposure”: A few tasks are affected, but the heart of the job isn't.

This job rates 43 out of 100 for how hands-on it is. The score above only looks at AI tools, not robots, but for work this far from the physical that matters less.

from the source Working Paper 140, Generative AI and Jobs 2025 index data 0.8-observed-use

Man v Bot · compare

Who holds up better?

Nursing associate professionals 78

v

Go on, try your partner's job. Or your sibling's. We won't tell.

Man v Bot

Where the bot helps, and where the human wins

Bot

What AI takes

The routine stuff. You may not miss it.

  • Updating patient records.
  • Care planning support.
  • Handover notes.

Man

What people still do better

Judgement, trust and skilled hands. Hard to download.

  • Hands-on nursing care.
  • Giving medication and treatment.
  • Noticing when a patient changes.

Both

What's arriving

New work that only exists because the AI does.

  • Voice-driven record keeping.
  • Remote monitoring alerts.
  • More care outside hospitals.

Written by a human, from the ILO's task ratings below. Yes, we see the irony. Read it as one person's take.

Meet your two rivals

They're not the same machine. AI software can only reach the parts of a job done on a screen or in words. A chatbot can't climb a ladder. A robot might, one day, if it doesn't fall off.

The AI

Lives in a screen. Never had to fix a boiler.

Threat level: Low

26 could do without you

It could take over very little of the work on its own. It could help with 63 of 100.

The robot

The wildcard. Has hands, still working out stairs.

How much it matters here: Some

43 how hands-on

A fair part of this job is hands-on, so robots would be needed for that part, not just software.

So could a robot do the physical part?

Less than half of this job is hands-on. Robots still matter, but for a smaller part of the work, so we don't sort it any further.

Robots hate fiddly work in awkward spaces. On that measure, this job scores 34 out of 100. The higher it is, the longer the robot waits.

43 How
hands-on
34 How fiddly
and cramped

Kind of hands-on work Less than half hands-on

The small print

They aren't a robot score, and nothing on this page is. Nobody measures how far robots have got well enough to put a number on it. These are the closest thing we have: how hands-on the job is, and how much fiddly, cramped work it takes, which is what Frey and Osborne found hardest for machines.

From O*NET, matched to one US job .

finger skill 42.9 · hand skill 42.9 · cramped spaces 16.2 · averaged · rule: hands-on under 50

estimated O*NET 31.0 BLS occupational crosswalk chain ISCO-08 to 2010 SOC (Aug 2012, rev. Jun 2015); 2010 to 2018 SOC (Nov 2017); O*NET-SOC 2019 taxonomy data 0.8-observed-use measures chosen by Frey & Osborne (2017) · the grouping is a sorting, not a measurement

The job, task by task

Every job is really a bundle of tasks. Here's this one unpacked, with how much of each AI could do, out of 100. The score is the average, and averages can hide a lot.

AI's favourite task here scores 62, against an average of 22. The bigger the gap, the more lopsided the job: some of it wide open to AI, some of it barely touched.

  1. 62

    Updating information on patients' condition and treatments received in record-keeping systems

    Medium
  2. 27

    Assisting in planning and managing the care of individual patients

    Low
  3. 15

    Providing nursing and personal care and treatment and health advice to patients according to care plans established by health professionals

    Very Low
  4. 12

    Administering medications and other treatments to patients, monitoring patients' condition and responses to treatment, and referring patients and their families to a health professional for specialised care as needed

    Very Low
  5. 8

    Assisting in giving first-aid treatment in emergencies.

    Very Low
  6. 7

    Cleaning wounds and applying surgical dressings

    Very Low

6 tasks · the High to Very Low labels are the ILO's

from the source Working Paper 140, Generative AI and Jobs 2025 index data 0.8-observed-use

Sidekick or replacement?

A tool that makes you faster is a very different thing from one that does the task while you watch. Jobs and Skills Australia measured the two separately, which is handy.

AI helps you
63
AI does it for you
26

Sidekick wins, by 37 points.

How good a match is this?

One Australian job matches this one closely, so this is about as reliable as it gets here.

estimated Our Gen AI Transition (Gen AI Capacity Study) September 2025 detailed data release data 0.8-observed-use matched to Australian jobs 4114

Meanwhile, in real life…

Everything else here is about what AI could do. This is what people actually did. When they asked Claude for help with this kind of work, did they hand the whole task over, or roll their sleeves up and work through it together?

Tiny sample alert This job makes up under 0.01% of all the conversations: a tiny slice. People using AI for a job isn't the same as AI being able to do it.

Out of every 100 conversations

52
48

worked through it together handed it over

The small print

Anthropic publishes this about its own product, and it doesn't feed into any score here. These are people who use Claude, not workers in general, so little use here doesn't mean AI can't reach the job.

These two add up to 100. The bars elsewhere on the page don't, because each is scored on its own, so we don't put them side by side.

observed use Anthropic Economic Index release 2026-06-26, period beginning 2026-05-01 data 0.8-observed-use 2026-05-01 · Anthropic, about its own product

So, should nursing associates be worried?

Short answer: not much. Some of the chores will change, and good riddance.

The paperwork is moving. Updating patient records is rated Medium, and planning care is Low; nursing care, medication and dressings rate Very Low. Digital records and voice notes could give time back to patients.

Worth remembering: we score tasks, not jobs. When AI takes on a task, the job usually reshuffles around it rather than vanishing.

Where this job could lead

None of the new jobs we've written up start from here yet. Could be you're the first. See the jobs AI is creating →

How are the neighbours doing?

There are 82 jobs in the “Technicians and associate professionals” family, averaging 65. This one is above the family average.

Pit this against any other job →