Editor’s Letter
We hope everyone is enjoying their spring and looking forward to a summer filled with great activities and (hopefully) a vacation or two.
Most of us are already aware of the current staffing challenges and the dire reports on the coming nursing shortage, but we thought you might like to read about some surprising ways the shortage might be alleviated.
Enjoy, and see you next month!
Tough times helping to alleviate the nursing shortage?
Stressed out about high gas and food prices, layoffs, and general economic malaise? There may actually be a silver lining to the current downturn for those in nursing and health care. According to the Wall Street Journal, the weak economy is propelling many nurses with flexible schedules to take on more shifts and move from part time to full time hours, thus reducing the strain on tight staffing in many of the nation's hospitals and health care centers. Other nurses are delaying retirement or returning to their nursing work after a sabbatical or pursuing other career paths.
For the past few decades, nursing has been a kind of reverse economic indicator. According to the WSJ, this trend is typical, with the number of nurses increasing approximately 3.5% during downturns, such as the ones following September 11, 2001, the 1980 downturn, and the recession of the early 1990s. When times are good, nursing only grows 2.4% on average.
But don't expect this trend to solve the deeper staffing problems, as the nursing shortage is expected to resume once the economy picks up again.
"We are seeing a temporary lessening of the nursing shortage," says Jane Llewellyn, vice president of clinical nursing affairs at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. But, she says, "as soon as the economy turns up we'll see them staying home again."
"Man enough" to be a nurse
We reported last month about the growing numbers of men who are entering the nursing profession (yea!), and now there's a grassroots effort among educators to get male middle and high school students interested in the field.
A new campaign by the Workforce Central Florida and Partners for a Healthy Community seeks to boost the numbers of male students entering nursing training. The "Are you Man Enough to be a Nurse" campaign targets male students and career changers with imagery of actual male RNs and strong benefit-driven copy about why nursing is a desirable career to enter right now.
PHC modeled its marketing plan after a successful campaign with the same name from the Oregon Center for Nursing and purchased the rights to the attention-getting tagline. The campaign imagery is comprised of eight male registered nurses from three of the five PHC hospital partners, Orlando Regional Healthcare, Florida Hospital and Health Central, and a future RN student. The RNs are diverse in age, ethnicity and specialty including critical care, ER, medical oncology and cardiac, and campaign graphics show their many hobbies such as rock climbing, surfing and music.
More "mid-career" professionals entering nursing
There's a growing number of "seasoned" professionals jumping the proverbial ship of their careers to enter nursing. Better pay, job security, and career satisfaction are just three of the reasons for the trend, according to a spokesman for the Massachusetts Nurses Association.
"Many people come to nursing because they see meaning," he said.
New book explores history of childbirth from a nurse's perspective
A longtime nurse recently won a book deal that explores the history of modern day birthing and shows the history of childbirth practices and some of the horrendous things that were done to women through the ages," according to the author. Phyllis Brodsky, who graduated from nursing school in 1957 and has decades of experience observing and teaching obstetrics, wrote the book for professionals and lay people alike to show how research is showing that technology is being overused in today's conventional birthing procedures.
"It tells how and why men got involved and what went on through the ages," Brodsky said. "It's not just about childbirth, it's about women and men's attitudes toward women. The book is for professionals and lay people. This has been on my mind for a long time," she said. "It was my ambition when I retired."
Texas nurses debate unionization
A fight to unionize Texas area nurses has moved from Houston, which saw its first successful union vote in March, to Dallas, which is about to consider an upcoming bid by the California Nurses Association (CNA) to change the way health care is run in the state.
Texas has not had a nurses' union since the 1970s, and the March 27th vote at Tenet Healthcare Corp., the nation's third largest publicly traded hospital system, was the first successful union vote in Texas' history. (The Texas Nurses Association did operate as a union in 1974. But in 1979, the members voted to drop union status.)
The push started last year with an agreement between Tenet and CNA that forces the healthcare provider to allow employees in certain states, including Texas. If the CNA succeeds in its bid to unionize, heath care in the state could change dramatically - for better or worse depends on who you ask.
Supporter of the bid point to the likelihood of unionized nurses earning larger paychecks, thus encouraging more people to enter the nursing profession, which would alleviate the nursing shortage and reducing workloads. Detractors argue that nursing unionization would simply raise costs and create animosity between nurses and hospital managers.
Travel nursing still going strong despite weak economy
Despite high gas prices and other economic woes, travel nursing is still a growing profession with plenty of opportunity for advancement. According to American Traveler, March has been the strongest month of 2008 so far thanks to the dramatic increase in travel nurse jobs in the US.
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