TX hospitals facing dire nursing shortage

[cougarnurse]

Thoughts or comments? State's hospitals face dire nursing shortage


An unprecedented shortage.

That's what the future holds for the nursing industry, according to more than one report coordinated through the Texas Department of State Health Services and affiliated organizations.

From a 2006 report:

The demand for registered nurses in Texas will grow by 86 percent by 2020. The supply, however, will grow by 53 percent without action. Texas will be 71,000 short of the full-time equivalent nurses it will need.

Texas produced 6,300 new graduates in its 84 nursing programs in 2005. That number needs to grow to 9,700 in 2010, to 18,000 in 2015, and to 25,000 in 2020.

A significant increase in enrollment must occur to reach those goals, the report said.

"A large investment of capital and human resources is also required.

Because there is an overabundance of qualified applicants seeking admission to nursing programs, the key factors to increasing enrollment are obtaining a sufficient number of nursing faculty and competitive faculty salaries," the report said.

Why is there a shortage?

The 2004 report "Increasing RN Graduates: Admission, Progression and Graduation in Texas Schools of Nursing 2004" said:

An increased demand for nurses has combined with a decreased supply of nurses who face unfavorable work conditions. Some contributing factors include an aging population and an aging nursing work force and a growing number of uninsured and underinsured people.

That report highlighted the following situations in Texas nursing schools:

Registered nursing programs saw a 63.6 percent increase in bachelor's degree program graduates and a 15.3 percent increase in associate degree program graduates between 1998 and 2004.

Still, a 2005 study by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board said about 4,220 qualified applicants were denied admission.

"This is an indication that the demand exceeds the capacity of nursing schools to educate more students," the RN graduates report said. "Factors such as the shortfall of nursing professors created by an aging cohort of faculty, noncompetitive faculty salaries, and insufficient funds to hire more faculty all impact the capacity of Texas schools of nursing to admit more students."

The state health department said in another document that the economic downturn has temporarily affected the supply and demand for nurses.

Hospitals are treating fewer people because people are delaying "costly elective surgeries," for example. Some nurses who planned to retire are remaining on the job, part-time nurses are seeking more hours and non-working nurses whose spouses have lost jobs are returning to work.

Those factors, though, are only temporarily masking the shortage, which will be compounded as America's aging population drives up the demand for nurses.

"The fundamental causes of the nursing shortage remain unchanged," the document says.

"We lack sufficient numbers of teachers and other resources to educate the nurses we still need."

[angryamerican999]

It's not rocket science...

Pay nursing faculty appropriately, expand nursing programs, and graduate more nurses.

Nursing students can afford to pay a little more for tuition if that's what it takes to get the faculty on board. The jobs are available and the ROI for a nursing education is great at twice the tuition price.

When will people with common sense be in charge?

[TammySue]

Originally Posted by angryamerican999

It's not rocket science...

Pay nursing faculty appropriately,

agreed. a few years ago i made a career change within nursing, and one of my options was to teach nursing at our community college. i contacted them, after they had informally spoken with me about it in the past. however, they had no full time positions, and benefits were not included. i would have had to work 2 days a week, basically a per diem arrangement when it came to wages, and not any more per hour than i was currently making.

to sum it up, i couldn't afford to do what i would have loved to do. so i chose a different option.

i don't believe i am alone in this situation.