How Magnet Hospitals are destroying Nursing

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  1. My Magnet Hospital

    • 17
      Has safe staffing ratios
    • 25
      Has unsafe staffing ratios
    • 16
      Hires too many inexperienced nurses
    • 12
      Hires enough experienced nurses

46 members have participated

Specializes in Long Term Acute Care, TCU.

1. 80 to 20 ratio of BSN to ADN

a. Approximately 40% of RN's are BSN, therefore, not enough domestic BSN's available.

b. BSN's are being imported from foreign nursing mills.

c. Foreign nurses will work for far less than domestic nurses.

2. Domestic BSN hires are mostly fresh grads with zero experience.

a. New BSN's are willing to work for far less than experienced BSN's/ADN's.

b. New BSN's aren't sensitive to staffing ratios.

c. New BSN's accept more acute/critical patients than they can safely provide care for.

And the list could go on. I'm sure you guys can add more items

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Specializes in Oncology/Haemetology/HIV.
1. 80 to 20 ratio of BSN to ADN

a. Approximately 40% of RN's are BSN, therefore, not enough domestic BSN's available.

b. BSN's are being imported from foreign nursing mills.

c. Foreign nurses will work for far less than domestic nurses.

2. Domestic BSN hires are mostly fresh grads with zero experience.

a. New BSN's are willing to work for far less than experienced BSN's/ADN's.

b. New BSN's aren't sensitive to staffing ratios.

c. New BSN's accept more acute/critical patients than they can safely provide care for.

And the list could go on. I'm sure you guys can add more items

1.b FALSE - with retrogression in place, facilities are unable to do so.

1.c. Sometimes but not always. However, since we currently can't import nurses easily, the point is moot. This, however, was a very common situation in the 80s and 90s, before retrogression and well before magnet status ever came into being.

2.a. Have you seen the posts from new grads that complain about pay. They are far too common and about much higher payrates than I got as a new grad.

2.b. Are you kidding, they also complain about ratios, that are much more favorable than those I had in the 90s.

2.c. False, no more than the average nurse, new or not, BSN or not. Please site evidence.

Please research your data and site some studies regarding thesse issues.

Trust me, there are plenty of much bigger enemies of good nursing than Magnet status.

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Specializes in NICU.

I can't speak for all Magnet hospitals but I like my (Magnet) hospital just fine and having been to half a dozen other hospitals as agency, I do think it's better.

Every hospital has its ups and downs, but we have excellent staffing ratios (I do level IIIC NICU) with mostly 2:1s, some 1:1s and rarely 3:1s (never 4:1s) and that includes all our step-down type assignments.

There are about a dozen nurses that have been with us since the 80s and the longest since the early 70s.

Our pay rate is among the highest (if not the highest) in the area as well with excellent night differentials.

I went to the Magnet conference last October and it was extraordinarily fascinating. I spoke with many people and did some people watching. What struck me the most was that so many people seemed desperate to tell me and folks they met how their hospital is awesome and why they are so much better in all ways possible compared to anyone else. Side note: it also displayed my naivety about health care $$ when I saw the vendor room which is oh my goodness enormous and somewhat unsettling.

One nurse I spoke with while in line told me that at her top ranked hospital (top 5), that particular hospital was requiring all current nurses to get BSNs (on their own dime) or be fired within a couple of years, even those with 20+ years of experience. That's wrong. I am only 3.5 years in as a RN and I know that someone with 20+ years in the NICU will hand me my bottom any day of the week and a BSN does make a difference in that.

So, that's a shame. But overall, I don't have any major complaints. I felt like we were getting credit for what we already do...

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Specializes in critical care, PACU.

OP where are your sources??? :specs:

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Specializes in Critical Care.

Requiring all RN's to get a BSN to practice and on their own dime of course and most likely for no pay raise is just a tactic to get rid of their experienced, older employees. Easy way to save money on pay, benefits, etc. I'm surprised all the hospitals haven't gotten on the bandwagon like they have with hourly rounds, bedside reports, customer service, etc, etc. Too bad there's not some exam you could take and get your BSN that way like certifications, but hey, ADN and BSN take the same boards so you don't take boards if you are already a working RN. I think that says it all!

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Specializes in Trauma/Critical Care.
1. 80 to 20 ratio of BSN to ADN

a. Approximately 40% of RN's are BSN, therefore, not enough domestic BSN's available.

b. BSN's are being imported from foreign nursing mills.

c. Foreign nurses will work for far less than domestic nurses.

2. Domestic BSN hires are mostly fresh grads with zero experience.

a. New BSN's are willing to work for far less than experienced BSN's/ADN's.

b. New BSN's aren't sensitive to staffing ratios.

c. New BSN's accept more acute/critical patients than they can safely provide care for.

And the list could go on. I'm sure you guys can add more items

I have to admit...I almost fell off my chair when I read your "facts". Where in the World are you getting this information? !!

When you list your sources/references about your above post, then we can initiate an "informed' discussion.

Take care.

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The first source is reporting in 2006 on a new program to look at issues involved in international nurse "migration," and most of the statistics quoted in the report are from the 1990s. IIRC, isn't 2006 when retrogression kicked in? Most of the information in the article is seriously out of date and doesn't apply to current situations.

While Nursing Against the Odds is a great book and I'm a fan of Suzanne Gordon, it was published in 2005 (so it was written quite a bit earlier than that), and the review was written in 2005. Again, things have changed a lot in nursing since then, so I'm not sure how valuable or pertinent a source it is today.

And, while I am sympathetic to the CNA and NNOC, the article from 2008 you reference is an opinion piece pushing a particular agenda.

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Specializes in Peds/outpatient FP,derm,allergy/private duty.

1) all of those links are predicated on outdated shortage predictions

2) none of them even mention your statements of supposed facts, except for the "study" of international recruitment companies sly hint that there is a dual pay structure or benefit system for foreign vs domestic nurses

3) none of them are studies

4) none of them are objective or impartial

5) all of them can be summarized by this statement contained in the link The True Forces Behind Magnetism

The structural imperatives of magnet hospital governance over nursing services cannot be harmonized with nor incorporated into collective bargaining representation.

What I don't understand is - why are BSNs the targets of your criticism if your union's issue is with Magnet horning in on the territory? Lots of BSNs work in non-Magnet hospitals, too. :confused:

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Specializes in Pedi.

An article published in December of 2011 compared patient outcomes in Magnet vs Non-Magnet facilities. The conclusion was that non-magnet hospitals had better patient outcomes and better RN skill mix, which they list as a contributing factor to the outcome.

Comparison of patient outcomes in magnet® and non... [J Nurs Adm. 2011] - PubMed - NCBI

I work at a "Magnet" institution and I have seen a huge change for the worse since we achieved "Magnet" status. We have staff employed as "Magnet" consultants, we pay for the CNO and other higher-up to attend a "Magnet" conference every year and we spend 100s of thousands of dollars to maintain this "magnet" status but staffing at the bedside is down, employee satisfaction is way down and we frequently lack the basic supplies to care for our patients. I have had to go to other units searching for linens when a patient soils the bed in the middle of the night, have been told that we have "no feeding pumps", "no beds" or "no cribs" left in the hospital [not no open rooms, no actual beds to put in an empty room so a patient can be admitted], have had to use the wrong size catheters for suctioning/straight cathing, etc. and the list could go on. Meanwhile, if you drive by the hospital you will see no less than a dozen signs advertising our absurdly high US News and World Report rankings.

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Specializes in Long Term Acute Care, TCU.

1 b. Foreign nurses enter the USA through Canada using the NAFTA loophole.

c. Foreign nurses work for less because our lowest pay is multiples of what they would make in their homeland.

2a. New BSN's are desperate for income to pay off their expensive loans.

b. New nurses bite their tongues to keep their jobs.

c. see 2b.

To KelRN

I hear the same from most floor nurses who work in Magnet Hospitals. They love the concept, yet hate the reality.

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