Study on recession's effect on nursing shortage

The hospitals intentionally short staff as a cost cutting measure. I wish patient's families would complain to administration.

A. I supervise prn at the hospital I work and we have a "staffing grid." We are not allowed a CNA until we have 7 patients (our m/s is very tiny). We are required to have 2 RN's even if we only have 1 pt on the floor though- it just means the RN has to do "aid work" which I think is good for us sometimes.

B. We will not be getting our usual 3% cost of living raise this year, but our hospital pays better then most of the rural hospitals in this area.

C. We bought into a "hospital sponsered insurance" which means we pay to use our hospital and its clinics and if we go elsewhere only a tiny portion is covered. We dropped using "Big Insurance" due to the cost. Its great unless we have to get a specialist....then were in deep doodoo.

D. We are not allowed to use staffing agency nurses now. When I started we used them all the time to fill in "holes" or when we had a call-in. Now we are to use our PRN pool only and if we are unable to find coverage the supervisor/managers have to work it.

E. People are not quitting as quickley as they once were (this is a good thing) Nurses used to rotate in and out, but it seems turnover has dropped considerably---Maybe we've improved??? but I think mostly nurses are just scared to be the low-man on the tottem pole in a new facility.

F. We get a $6.00/hr bonus for coming in on our day off to work if a shortage does occur. They have made new rules for this bonus which makes it harder to get, but not unfair.

I am not seeing anything different. I experienced purposeful short-staffing before the recession and there's no difference now.

Buerhaus, P. I., Auerbach, D. I., & Staiger, D. O. (2009). The Recent Surge In Nurse Employment: Causes And Implications. Health Affairs (Project Hope). doi: 10.1377/hlthaff.28.4.w657.
The abstract from Pub med:
Center for Interdisciplinary Health Workforce Studies, Institute for Medicine and Public Health, at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee.

Registered nurse (RN) employment has increased during the current recession, and we may soon see an end to the decade-long nurse shortage. This would give hospitals welcome relief and an opportunity to strengthen the nurse workforce by addressing issues associated with an increasingly older and foreign-born workforce. The recent increase in employment is also improving projections of the future supply of RNs, yet large shortages are still expected in the next decade. Until nursing education capacity is increased, future imbalances in the nurse labor market will be unavoidable. [Health Affairs 28, no. 4 (2009): w657-w668 (published online 12 June 2009; 10.1377/hlthaff.28.4 .w657)].



The article referenced by the press release does not seem to actually say the nursing shortage is over, but rather may be improving.
As most above seem to be saying, even if the nursing shortage ended, hospitals would simply find another reason for not hiring adequate staff.
If RN staffing ratios are mandated, support staff will be reduced making the net effect zero.
Safe patient staffing is going to be a long and difficult battle. Increasing the RN workforce seems not to be an effective strategy.

My understanding is that, generally, "the shortage" really applied to LTC facilities and the like. I have read some posters on this site who work in LTC saying that they still have a light shortage -- but it is more a problem of LTC not being attractive to new grads.

For some reason this article specifically addressed "hospital nurses" and "hospitals" but I wonder if that is just poor writing.

As for the poster that saw a nurse work 24hrs -- I cannot believe that is allowed. That is terrible, physically, for the nurse involved. If I had been a patient I would have sent a letter to the CEO stating how disgusted I was.

Of course they would probably blame the nurse.

Its sad. Hospitals see nurses as cost centers. They still have a shortage and need nurses but choose not to spend money to hire. The horrible patient/nurse ratio will get worse, and at the end of the day the ones that will ultimately suffer will be patients.

Management is just pushing the limit and its only a matter of time until something catastrophic happens due to lack of nurses. Then they will blame the nurses who were there at the time. This is why nurses need strong unions so they are not put into such tenuous circumstances.

I keep looking but I still haven't been able to find that nursing shortage everyone keeps talking about. Also a nurse working 24 hours straight? I live in california and I am sure the state would looove to catch a facility allowing that. I have never seen or heard of it until now.