[Giant Panda]

I couldn't find the online article, but this was in my local paper, The Appeal Democrat, and I thought I'd share and see what kind of personal experiences and opinions you all have to share on the topic. I find it very interesting, as I only now starting my pre-requisites to get into the RN program.

National nursing organizations have warned for years that the dangerous shortage of hospital nurses is about to get a lot worse, and will eventually kill hospitalized patients. Sofia Jaramillo says this will not happen on her watch if she can help it.
Jaramillo works in a medical intensive care unit at Via Christi Regional Medical Center-St. Francis Campus. A few days ago, two of her patients died of...

Read article in its entirety:

http://www.kansas.com/news/story/455583.html

[I love my cat!]

Hi!! There is a thread on this article already. Here is the link......
Need for Nurses thread

[november551]

What's funny about where I work is that there are 2 open positions, no shortage of qualified applicants, yet no budget to hire RNs. In the meantime we all work short. In the meantime my manager reports a certain percentage of unfilled positions. The term nursing "shortage" is misleading, in my humble opinion.

[mdm106]

The hospitals are causing the nursing shortage on purpose. No one wants to do three peoples jobs instead of just their own. I had a unit manager who was ! a good friend. She showed me her 5000.00 bonus from the hospital for short staffing the unit on purpose. Our hospital is now trying to do away with the nurse aides and Make the nurses do total care on 8 patients. Our patients now days are in worse shape. The ones we get now days would have been in ICU 20 years ago. THe hospitals are causing thier own shortage by trying to run the hospitals like factorys. IT doesnt work!!!! THese are people not factory parts.

[embarrasingfield]

I'm sorry Sweet Peas.

The shortage will never never be over.

Becasue noone in power that could actually help cares. And they never will. Because they are not hard-wired to care.

[fireflies_for_me]

I think the nursing shortage is certainly more severe for RNs then it is for LPN/LVNs. In my area, a friend of mine had recently moved back from Ohio, and it took her almost 4 months to find work. Now, I live in a town centrally located to 4 community colleges that are pumping out LPNs left and right so that we are flooded with LPNs. But if you are an RN you can walk the circle and basically choose what position you'd like to have.

Carly

[embarrasingfield]

lol- in my area there is actually a large facility that cannot properly acrue RN's.

They utilize Nursing Agency staff. They complain about their shortage yet they can't seem to figure out that their HR is incompetent. I klnow quite a few RN's who have tried to apply there. The HR giggles "yes, the compuet software is not working, but keep trying. "LOL. Thats been going on for years.

Embarrasing Field.

[ChristineN]

When I worked med-surg, I saw in-pt high acuity units, that would be very poorly staffed (RN's with 6-8 pts on daylights PCT's 12-20) yet unit managers that would refuse to hire more staff. It's management decisions like this that caused my floor to have alot of burnt out staff, as well as one of the highest rates of pt falls in the hospital. I live in a large metropolitan city where there are plenty of nurses looking for work, but it's almost as if some of these floors are hesitant to hire. This facility is also trying to attain Magnent status, which I don't see happening anytime soon.

[tropicalfish]

Working as a staff nurse is horrible for all of the reasons I see previously stated. The hospital where I work (urban community hospital in a major city) is chronically short staffed due to hospital administration paying low rates and staffing the floors with 1 RN to 9 patients, including on the telemetry unit which receives pts from ER, ICU, Cath Lab. They are rolling out a new plan which they are claiming is not a nursing registry/pool, but which is-----any nurse would know that it is a registry. They are paying a base rate for the registry which is a full $8 to $13 less than registry at other area hospitals. The base rate is $3/hour less than the CURRENT Registry rate. If I were Registry I'd quit and go work some place else. No unit has a unit clerk after 3pm including ICU where I work. We are expected to put in all of our orders, answer the phone, etc ourselves. The house supervisor asked the RNs to go do a scheduled stress test with meds---everyone refused to go because we hadn't been trained and hosp administration knew that the procedure had been scheduled so why wasn't anybody on call from that department? Actually there is no on call personnel---they rely on ICU RNs to do these and some of the RNs do it (they have previous job experience in the area). (the procedure was scheduled for the weekend when the dept is closed). I believe that RNs need to call their state's Department of Professional Regulation when this type of thing occurs. I also believe we need to call our state and US Senators and Representatives when these things occur. I have been in the position of being fired for refusing to do things that I am not trained in. The US Senators and Reps have websites in my state and I think probably in all states. I have written to mine on more than one occassion. I just read an article about one of my US Senators-----he is talking about staffing in my state. We also need to write letters to the Editor in local newspapers and any other newsletters available in our area. The purpose would be to teach the public. I have been an RN for over 30 years and it is becoming unbearable to work due to the disrepect of Hospital Administration and Nursing Management. They are totally uncaring about RNs and only are interested in keeping their 6 figure incomes while taking it out of our paychecks.

[mznurse]

I see the nursing shortage as a problem that will continue to be ongoing for a long time to come. There are not enough RN's, but there are lots of LPN's who could do the LPN to RN programs that are becoming more popular and accessible to those of us LPN's who desire to make the change to RN, so we can help ease the shortage and at the same time, increase our earning potential as well. i have been an LPN for 23 yrs and I am seriously considering doing one of the programs. Where I went to LPN school and the hospital that turned us out as LPN's now has an LPN to RN 1 year program and it is already full for the class to start in August. I plan on signing up as soon as they are doing it for the next class so I can realize my original plan to become an RN one day. I want to earn a BSN so I can be practical nurse instructor.That's always been my goal, and after 25 years, I'll be doing just that. Then I can have a hand in educating new nurses so they can help ease the crunch and hope that many will eventually become RN's themselves. This will be my way of helping to ease the shortage in a few short years and turn out good nurses for a life long career as a professional nurse.