Nor Cal Nursing Lay offs and New Grad Program Cuts...despite the nursing shortage

caliotter3 · Nov 15, 2008

And I remember when I had been laid off over 15 years ago the guy at the EDD office was thinking I should go to Redding to work 2 shifts a week at $7 an hour, or if I wanted, something similar in the Tenderloin. I told him no thanks I could live in my car anywhere.

Faeriewand, ASN, RN · Nov 15, 2008

would love to see suzanne post her opinion on this. :)

i am shocked that this is happening. i thought there was a nursing shortage all over. and no new grad programs?!? thought kaiser was a safe bet. keep us posted on what's happening.

prime took over the hospital where i work too but i wasn't working there then.

dionne says shasta regional would have closed if prime healthcare services of southern california had not stepped in as the hospital's new managers.

suzanne4, RN · Nov 16, 2008

And here is my opinion since it was asked for. Things have been tight for new grads in Northern Ca for sometime, and layoffs are hitting all over the place including nursing. And not just in the North Bay area.

There have been many lay-offs on the Peninsula as well. And in other fields as well. When people get laid off, the first thing that they do is cut back on medical care most of the time, and anything that does not need to be done is not going to be. Money from medicare is being cutback and money from CA for the uninsured is also less. Without money coming in, services get cancelled or cut back significantly. This is just not in healthcare, but it happens in other fields as well.

My friends that live in the Shasta area all commute down to the Santa Rosa area for work and have been doing this for quite sometime.

There has not been a nursing shortage all over for quite sometime. And expecially in the Bay Area. Especially for those that are new grads. Those with a couple of years of experience can usually find work in the city, but anything less than that and they are having big issues. And this has been for more than two years or so. There are many more new grads coming out of programs in the Bay Area than there are new grad programs to handle just them. Remember that most of the larger facilities only offer new grad programs two to three times per year and they only take 12 to 15 per group.

For LVNs, there has not been a hospital hiring in quite sometime, they are actually doing away with the LVNs in most of the facilities that I am familiar with. They are either being moved to other jobs are in school to get their RN. This became more common place when the ratio laws took effect.

CA also is high on the list for unemployment in all of the states in the US, so this is not helping things either.

BonnieSc · Nov 17, 2008

Suzanne, I want to say thanks for having told it like it is for the past two years. I only wish that those of us who graduated just when the job market started to get tight had known what it was going to be like... though, of course, even some of the people who were hired as new grads were laid off before finishing their six months.

Now we need the media to start paying more attention to this story. People need to know how hard it is to get the initial job, and that nursing is NOT recession-proof. It may be one of the more recession-proof careers out there, but it isn't a sure thing. No one should be going into nursing if all they're looking for is a sure thing, because they won't find it.

jbluehorseh · Dec 15, 2008

I been looking for a job all over Nor-cal there just seems to very few new grad progam and or the hospital will hire a experinced RN before a new grad.