Nursing shortage being tackled at high school leve

[nursinghumor]

October 8, 2004, Connecticut: Nursing shortage being tackled at high school level:"Wallingford -- The state's nurses are in short supply and statistics show that Connecticut will be short thousands of nurses in the next 20 years but high schools in the state are now trying to fill the growing void of vacant positions. In about 15 years, millions of seniors will be on medicare. The federal government expects Connecticut will be almost 22,000 nurses short to meet future medical needs. The push is on for young people to enter health care professions."
http://www.wfsb.com/Global/story.asp?S=2402996

Andrew Lopez, RN
http://www.4nursing.com

[ns lpn]

I often wonder if we will actually run into a surplus in heath care and jobs will be hard to find. I know in Nova Scotia it's not hard to find work as an LPN but it's hard to get positions due to the increased number of grads every year I suspect the future here for LPN grads looks very bleak as far as finding full time work positions. Most of our RN's move away and though some say its for better pay and benifits the majority leave because there are very few positions available that are full time. It seems to be the way of the world no one wants to hire a full time staff when they can fill it with a few people they don't have to pay benifits to and often they will subsitute and LPN in place of an RN where years ago they would have bulked at the idea saying it would be unsafe...sometimes it still is unsafe but the mighty dollar seems to be more important then the people involved. I hope with all the push on creating more heath workers in highschools they start focusing on creating better work places to put them in.

[nursinghumor]

As long as nurses are willing to take the part-time positions, the hospitals will continue to offer them.

If no one took the part-time positions, they'd have no choice but to offer full-time with benefits.

With hospitals I agree, the bottom line is saving money anyway they can. My wife was telling me the other day that several Baylor Program (work two twelves on weekends, get paid for 36 with full benefits) positions that people left were not being filled. The nurse manager instead wanted to change them to 2-3 part-time positions which did not pay benefits.

Far as a surplus, maybe if you've got a ton of nursing schools in an area, but otherwise warm bodies with licenses should be able to find plenty of work RN, LPN, CNA, etc. for a long time to come.

Facilities won't focus on improving working conditions unless we push for it. Otherwise, they'll try to get away with as little improvements as possible.

Andrew Lopez, RN
http://www.4nursing.com

[Aaron C.]

[ QUOTE ]
the bottom line is saving money anyway they can

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not so sure that is totally accurate. If you look at administrators salaries, I'm quite sure they haven't gone down any

[nursinghumor]

Aaron,

Compared to blue-collar staff, hospital CEOS, managers and administrator's salaries are not subject to cost cutting on a regular basis.

It is to the hospital's advantage to pay them well, and offer them bonuses when they do cut costs substantially. This is especially true regarding employee labor costs which are usually the largest line item in a hospital's budget.

You don't see administrators forming unions to fight for higher pay and better benefits, they have them already.

Andrew Lopez, RN
http://www.4nursing.com

[LeahNTexas]

I have talked to many nurses, and they say the problem with the shortage will continue to increase because of the high patient/low nurse ratio. Like Andrew Lopez said, I think it is right to say that if we stopped taking part time work, they would have no choice but to offer full time work with benefits.

Leah L. Logan

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