"That's a myth about nursing"

Nurses General Nursing

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I just got off the phone with a young applicant to rent from me. I mentioned that I worked yesterday, so she asked me what I did. She's a college student herself.

She said, "Oh, wow, that's a busy job! There's always a need for nurses!" I replied that that's a myth about nursing. There's not always a nursing shortage, sometimes it's difficult to get a job. I said that I'm not sure who's responsible for the myth, but that there are a lot of for profit nursing schools that have popped up, and I'm sure they are partially responsible. Unfortunately, the quality of nursing education has gone down with that trend.

I told her, the need for nurses comes in cycles, just like other sectors of the economy.

Specializes in Geriatrics, Home Health.
JKL, I do think your scenarios are common, but I also find it common to hear nurses, newer nurses in particular, complain about not being able to find a job right away... and then come to fund out they've only been applying to acute care positions.

Many non-acute jobs require acute care experience. When I graduated in 2008, even nursing homes wanted 1 year of med-surg.

Big medicine is big business. They would like nothing more than for the market to get oversaturated with qualified nursing applicants, thus driving down wages.

There isn't a shortage of nurses. There is a shortage of nurses willing to work under current bedside nursing conditions.

I wish I could like this statement more than once.

Even at the height of the greatest shortages I have ever seen, the shortage is concentrated in jobs almost nobody would want.

There is NOT a shortage of NP students.

There is NOT a shortage of nursing students who expect to "only want to do ED, Peds, or ICU"

There seems to be a shortage of nurses willing to work full-time bedside positions on floors like Ortho, Surgical, or acute rehab.

I wish I could like this post a thousand times. In those units, a lot of the new hires are new nurses who go there to get experience and leave. Once you get your experience, the willingness to work in those type of area reduces. Many long term cares facilities in my area can not staff RN's in their facilities because they are poorly managed. and risk too much liability.

In my city, there is actually a huge demand for nurses. Nurses are being lost left and right to the nearby Childrens Hospital and the VA. No one wants to work in the smaller clinics, smaller hospitals or nursing homes so they are offering insane sign on bonuses and travel compensation. I think it just depends where you are if the shortage is myth of fact

This. It really is dependent upon where you live. I have lived in places where hospitals were crying for nurses. Other places, not so much. No one is wrong.

This. It really is dependent upon where you live. I have lived in places where hospitals were crying for nurses. Other places, not so much. No one is wrong.

Well...not sure about that.

The problem is that when everyone (nursing organizations, nursing textbooks, institutions that educate nurses, employers of nurses, etc.) constantly talks about "the shortage" as if it is an overwhelming/"everywhere" problem, it really only drives toward one solution - that of increasing the general nursing workforce - without answering whether that does anything at all to help areas actually facing local shortage for local reasons, and without worrying about how those measures affect areas that aren't experiencing shortage. This conversation and others here would certainly suggest pockets of shortage rather than an overwhelming lack of RNs across the country. Yet it seems there are always ongoing efforts to find out how to produce more RNs faster - which is a goal with consequences that go well beyond just saturating the market in some areas.

Suffice it to say that the number of entities that stand to profit/benefit from this constant claim of nursing shortage really confounds this issue. It does matter what we're talking about: Not enough nurses will come here, or there aren't enough nurses, period.

Specializes in Psychiatry, Community, Nurse Manager, hospice.

There is in fact always a need for nurses. Meaning, nurses are necessary for society 100% of the time.

I am glad that nurses are savvy. Time to start unions.

These "for profit schools"... how are the students actually passing their boards to cause this flu? Seems impossible

I'm in a union in DC and have been for the last 20 yrs... it's an absolute necessity... nurses need to stand up for themselves... REALIZE THAT YOU HAVE SO MUCH MORE POWER THAN U THINK!!... ESPECIALLY AS A GROUP... if nurses would work together, we could accomplish absolutely anything... hands down...no dispute... ANYTHING

Specializes in NICU.

Sorry but I have never seen the need go away except for a 3 mo lay off several years ago who were promptly hired back,many had move on to new positions.

Big medicine is big business. They would like nothing more than for the market to get oversaturated with qualified nursing applicants, thus driving down wages.

There isn't a shortage of nurses. There is a shortage of nurses willing to work under current bedside nursing conditions.

I don't necessarily agree with you. In some ways what you say makes a great deal of sense. In others, I don't agree.

There is in fact, a shortage currently in the OR. It will only get worse as more of our workforce nears retirement. The cost to train a nurse to be competent in the OR is astronomical, even compared to other specialties. Right now, one can make an absolute fortune traveling. I have not done so, as I am interested in finishing my graduate degree. Part of the problem here is that even where we can and do train new to OR nurses, the number of people available or good to precept would be overwhelmed by the number of people who need precepted and trained.

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