Patching up the shortage
Nursing shortages can be consistent or intermittent depending on the current number of patient needing medical attention. In order to respond to this fluctuating census, health care industries have utilized float pool nurses and agency nurses. Float pool nurses are nursing staffs employed by the hospital to work in any unit within the organization. Agency nurses are employed by an independent staffing organization and have the opportunity to work in any hospitals on a daily, weekly or contractual basis.
Similar to other professionals, both types of nurses can only work within their licensed scope of practice, training, and certification.
Float pool nurses and agency nurses, as mentioned by First Consulting group, are currently used in response to the current shortage. Use of the said services increases the cost of healthcare, decreases specialty, and decreases the interest in long-term solutions to the shortage. On the other hand, international recruitment gives rise to concerns on clinical competencies, cultural sensitivity, and ethics in global recruitment. Foreign-trained recruitment has been touted as a “stop-gap”, but is by no means a solution. In the United States nurses from Philippines, India, South Korea and China have been seen as prime recruiting grounds. However, the past several years have seen some unintended consequences of this aggressive recruitment, e.g., the 2006 nurse test selling scandal that was reported in the Philippines.
A growing response to the nursing shortage is the advent of travel nursing a specialized sub-set of the staffing agency industry that has evolved to serve the needs of hospitals affected by the increasing nursing shortage. According to the Professional Association of Nurse Travelers, there are an estimated 25,500 Registered Nurse Travelers working in the U.S. The number of LVN/LPN Nurse Travelers is not known.
Retention and recruitment
Retention and recruitment are important responses to a long-term solution to the nursing shortage. Some of the reasons that contribute to retention of nursing in the healthcare field are addressed in different levels and are as follows. In spite of the discontent, nurses continue to practice. Also, there is a co-relation of high job satisfaction and significant education activities among nurses. Other possible solutions is through incentives and funding coupled with employer and hospital regulatory approach to retain the current number of staff and could help avoid aggravating turnover. To assist the healthcare field, congress annually approves a budget for the year through the Nurse Reinvestment Act passed in 2002. Previously in 2004 and 2005, 141.9 million and 205 million were approved in each fiscal year, respectively. The funding is distributed to advance nursing education, scholarships, grants, diversity programs, loan repayment programs, nursing faculty programs, and comprehensive geriatric education. Efforts of some states to address the nursing shortage in United States focused on the nursing working conditions. Currently, mandatory overtime for nurses is prohibited in nine states, hospital accountability to implement valid staffing plans in seven states, and only one state implement the minimum staffing ratio.
In terms of recruitment, suggestions were made in order make nursing attractive as a profession. One of these suggestions was presenting Nursing as a unique discipline, making it an attractive field for the young people. As mentioned in retention, incentives and funding to recruitment effort can contribute to the solution. Many hospitals believe retention is more important than recruitment. They feel that if you treat an employee well, they will be your best recruiters. Word of mouth goes far.
Source: Nursing shortage - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia