Questioning the Decision of Nursing

[ChihuahuaMamaX2]

I lost a relative (the grandmother who raised me & for whom I was the primary caretaker until her last 2 yrs when she required a nurse) because of inadequate medical care in a nursing home. I tell myself that it was due to under-staffing because I like to think the professional wasn't simply inadequate herself (after all, she had the decency to attend the funeral and give me her regards directly). After deeply mourning for over a year, I recently decided instead of being upset over my loss, that I would help. After all, the media was plastered with messages about nursing shortages (and surely that was why the most beloved person in my life was taken years too soon).

So, I tell my boss I'm changing fields, cut my hours back to 40/wk, make my significant other take on a 2nd job (poor guy works 7 days a week!), and, after work, off to evening/weekend classes I go.

But now I learn that not only is there not a nursing shortage, but that the real problem is inadequate funding to hire more nurses. What?! Does that mean my mission to become a nurse is just a waste?

Then, to make matters worse, today I read this... Maryland cuts nursing facilities funds another $23 million! http://is.gd/1PFSy Are they serious?!! Not only am I outraged to the point that I've already cried once since reading this, but I'm seriously questioning why I should become a nurse?

Obviously there's no nursing shortage, obviously there are willing and competent nurses in the world, obviously they just need the funding to be hired.

Now that I no longer have a grandparent to care for, I so wanted to care for the relatives of other people. But how can I do that when there isn't even the funding for anyone to hire me and all the other current and future nurses so that adequate care CAN be delivered? Right now I feel that the poor medical professionals are spread so thin that it's a miracle anyone makes it out of a hospital alive. How does the government expect health care professionals to sustain at this level? I read the posts, I talk to nurses, I know how insanely hard they already have it. Then, to cut budgets even more?!!! Leave it to the politicians to make the situation even worse than it already is.

I'm losing hope that I can even make a small difference in a situation that seems to be growing even more dysfunctional by the day...

[shrasberry]

I totally feel your fustration

[GilaRRT]

Issues of finance and politics exist in every career. You have to decide what you want to do and what you are willing to tolerate. Unfortunately, the economy is in a bad way and cuts from health care among other important areas are going to occur. Our country is going through rough times, and I would not be surprised to see the situation deteriorate.

Your assessment on hiring is not totally accurate. Many nursing positions remain unfilled; however, you may be required to move to another town or state to fill these open positions. The days of an easy to obtain nursing job a few steps away from the house are over for the moment. If you are not willing to relocate, you may want to consider other options. Additionally, there is more competition for the jobs. Unfortunately, it is a wake up call for all the people who thought nursing was the recession proof magic bullet. We are all effected by the current situation, and you should expect more difficulty in obtaining nearly any new avenue of employment. The good news is, it is not impossible.

Good luck.

[leslie :-D]

seriously, i would not advise anyone to enter nursing at this time.

betw the recession, cut backs/freezes, and seemingly a surplus of nurses, i would think that obtaining a job would be quite challenging.

however you choose to proceed, i wish you the best of everything.

leslie

[PostOpPrincess, BSN, RN]

I have to disagree with Leslie, although with much respect. I think that eventually the shortage will come back and with full force. If Obama's healthcare reform passes and we have an onslaught of new patients, we are going to have major staffing issues and discombobulated hospitals.

The pendulum swings like it always has. Shortage...quiet....no shortage....then horrible shortage. I still remember the 2000 shortage when I begged 7 nurses to come in at 3 a.m. to help recover the 8 patients who were 1:1 fresh Open hearts. 3 a.m!!!!

I loved those seven nurses and never, ever forgot them for what they did. I also remember the nights when I was begging that there be no codes when I was the only one on the team that was available to respond.

You know...my heart palpitates even now.

I think this is a temporary situation. Longer than what we are used to...but temporary nonetheless.

Whatever you choose, good luck to you in your future endeavors....

[onetiredmomma]

There will always be sick people to care for. My generation is aging fast and we will need nurses. I agree with Jo. Students just starting out may find themselves graduating at just the right time. If nursing is your passion I say go for it.

[Music in My Heart]

At some point the new grads will be set. Many of the "new grads" who preceded them may well be screwed, however, because they will not be "new grads" anymore but won't have any work experience either.

Sure, the pendulum will swing at some point, but if your timing is wrong, you could find yourself heavily in debt with a useless degree and a useless license.

I'm with Leslie... at this point I'd be hard-pressed to suggest anybody enter nursing school.

[fetch33]

I work in the Midwest.. we still have lots of positions unfilled PLUS I know of 5 nurses I work with on nights that will be moving in the near future.... more unfilled positions. I think it just depends on where you live. There are nursing jobs out there.

[nursemike, ASN, RN]

As of June, my hospital is fully staffed. Same was true when I started, four years ago. By December, they were hiring, again, and I'll be next pay they will be, next December. We have some advantages in recruiting, and at least half a dozen nursing schools within 50 miles or so.

The shortage is real, and it isn't. There are plenty of licensed nurses in the US, but many who are not actively nursing. The job market is tighter in the current economy. A friend who was told that in this economy, she should consider herself lucky to have a job, had an interview three days later.

Most nurses are young women. The turnover in nursing is horrendous. These two facts are not unrelated. A woman at my facility making around 45-50K may have a husband or fiancee making 30K. He gets a job offer to make 60K somewhere else, and she can get a job anywhere, so we have a job opening.

Or she (or, please, Lord, he) marries a doc making 200K and says to heck with nursing (just kidding--it happens, but not that often). Or a nurse of any age or gender gets disgusted and goes to truck-driving school.

Opportunities vary from region to region. Before the current recession, I was throwing away 3-4 recruiting brochures a month. Now I'm getting them at a rate more like one every month or two. The market is tight. If I wanted another job, I'd actually have to go out and look for it, just like a regular person. It might well be 2-3 more years before recruiters come begging, again. We aren't recession proof, but we're rolling in clover compared to a lot of fields. This is not the time for a nurse to think, "I've always wanted to try my hand as a car salesman." And I'm putting truck-driving school on the back burner, for now.

That said, there are plenty of reasons to stay out of nursing. It has many of the drawbacks of retail sales or food service, plus assorted nasty bodily fluids and lots and lots of stress. It's hard, sometimes thankless work. Red-tape can make you crazy, especially when there's an actual human patient whose very life may be at stake. (Red tape goes out the window during a code, but our goal is actually to fix the problem before it gets that far, and it can be hard to get the bean counters to see that.)

I still encourage friends who are considering nursing. It's a great field. But I'm not as gung ho as I used to be, because it's a terrible field. Job security alone is not reason enough to get into nursing, but still, compared to a lot of fields, it is one reason.

[llg, PhD, RN]

If your true motive for being a nurse is that you want to do nursing work ... then I'd recommend becoming a nurse. The job situation is tough right now, but as others have said, market conditions change every couple of years. If that is the kind of work you want to do, there will be opportunities to do it.

Just don't expect it to be as easy as you imagined. The market conditions of 2 - 5 years ago gave people a false sense of security. Some not only believed that nursing is recession-proof, but also that they would be able to waltz right in and get the job of their dreams with a perfect schedule, perfect boss, perfect coworkers, perfect patients, perfect compensation, etc. Reality has always given such people a rude awakening -- hence the high percentage of people who quit nursing (or at least their first couple of jobs) early in their careers.

It just might not be as easy to "save the world" as many people think it is. The reasons the world is not perfect is not because nobody tries to help ... but rather ... problems exist because they are hard to solve. Heroes are rare not because no one wants to be one ... but rather, because most people either can't or won't do the very difficult things needed to be one.

[Groobie1]

I currently work in a completely different career that has seen a HUGE downturn off and on over the years, I go to nursing school and expect to graduate next year. The one thing I've come to expect in my 16 year career that downturns occur everywhere, hiring freezes happen everywhere, but all of a sudden there is a massive shortage. I try to keep optimistic because school is difficult enough without worrying about what MAY happen. Try not to let others bring you down.

[oramar]

If you decide to continue with nursing be very careful of your own sensibilities. A person who enters the profession for all the right reasons is the person who will frequently experience sever burnout. It just tears a person who really wants to do things correctly but must compromise constantly to pieces. A person who is just there for the money, well it doesn't bother them one bit to ignore psyco/social issues because there are so many task to preform.