Utah suffering severe nurse shortage

Surely removed original, posted in wrong thread.

My first nursing position was in Burn/trauma icu at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, Utah and I could not have asked for a nicer experience. I was a new nurse, new wife and hundreds of miles from home. Talk about stress. Plus ,I'm from the south where we have our own problems with predjudice, so I didnt know what to expect. The hospital was top notch, my orientation was excellent (much better than anything I've received back home) and the people were very friendly and accepting. I had heard the same stories re:LDS and was cautious but everyone was great. People went out of their way to help us and boy did they love our accent. We eventually moved back home and I am glad we did , but SLC will always be a special place for me. Bottom line, don't knock a state until you tried it -you just might like it. Nicki

Well it looks like a worldwide problem!
We at nursingschool notice it in the quantitiy of people wanting to come here, a few years ago, we had up to a hundred who wanted to start here, last year we had 12!

I am sure it isn't the money, cause the pay isn't that bad here, neither are the other working conditions. like the times etc.

At the moment we've got a course for 35 nurses from the "east", Russia, Rumenia, Poland etc.
They have to learn German and do the State Exam next year in May.

Take care, Renee

Here in cental Mississippi we have a flood of nurses. It seems like a nursing shortage in any of the hospitals only because of managed care. Here average pt load 8-12 patients. As far as salary goes..I make more at my small hospital than I would at the bigger hospitals..I make $14.50 hr as an LPN/IV certified. The hospitals here say we are a dime a dozen (which is true here) but many are starting to do travel nursing. I would do the travel thing too if my children weren't so young. As for polygamy....every time I do laundry and dishes it doesn't sound so bad to me ha ha ha. I am catholic but I can understand how in history it came about. I don't knock any other state. I originally came from Illinois and moved here to Mississippi 10yrs ago. Tons of ppl asked why move to Mississippi...poorest state in the union. I love it here and would not move back. Lots of misconceptions on Mississippi too. That in itself is a form of predjudice. People miss a lot with their eyes closed and their hearts turned away. I love the ppl..the scenery and the FOOD!!!

Just wondering...how much does a RN make in Utah?

"First of all, we seem to have some real misconceptions regarding Utah. Most people would not want to leave families and areas they are familar with to go to a state we consider almost as cold as Alaska. I really don't beleive it has anything to do with the history of the LDS. Consider this, I could be wrong but, I think that Utah or at least that area, maybe wyoming was one of the first states to give women the vote. And Pleeeeaaaasssseeeee, poligomy is not that prevailant. NO I AM NOT FROM UTAH OR A LDS. Just a history buff that is also a nurse." Stirlady

Being from utah, I can also say that polygamy is NOT very common and I don't believe that women are oppressed and that the lds church has anything to do with the shortage (I am non-mormon). I did a research paper on the nursing shortage just recently. The majority of the problem lies in that there are not enough faculty to teach nursing students combined with the aging babyboomers which equals more retiring nurses and not enough new nurses entering the field to care for them. New jobs not previously available to new graduate students (such as astronauts, developments with computers, etc.) women in general are moving away from the traditional "women's jobs" such as nursing, social work, teaching, etc. to work in these new fields. There has been trouble retaining nurses for the same reasons as are present nationally. Nurses are being treated poorly with being put in charge of too many patients (resulting in burnout), not being paid enough for the amount of work put into going through nursing school, abuse at work (from doctors who can be verbally abusive and condescending to nurses), etc. Recruiting nurses from out of the country will not help because it is a worldwide shortage. Unless we can get more youth interested in nursing and also increase the faculty to allow for more nursing students, the situation will not improve.

Keely

I worked last night with a wonderful agency nurse. Of course we discussed the current shortage of regular staff here and elsewhere. She made a good point. She said she spent 4 yrs and thousands of dollars to become an RN working agency she makes 26 dollars per hour weekdays and 28 weekends. Meanwhile her neice took a six week on the job training course to be a post whole digger and she makes 30 dollars an hour. Her point was this: If we screw up on our job someone may die if her neice screws up they will dig another whole. Definately cause for some resentment with nurses. We literally hold peoples lives in our hands and for the most part we make less than a majority of other less skilled careers do. This makes no sense why would any thinking person go into nursing in order to make a living when they could do lots of other things with less education and less stress. Ya gotta really love nursing these days cause it sure aint the best paying job.

Ya think low pay might have something to do with it..........????

Amen! Let's shout it from the housetops! And the reason we don't have enough nursing faculty is.....EXTREMELY LOW PAY!!!!

'sigh'...it's an international problem. I worked in Swizerland and France and there is a shortage everywhere. We really must LOVE our job to stay...but you know what? I'm pretty proud to be a nurse!
Cheers!