So, what happened to all the nursing jobs?

[RaycerX]

Can anyone tell me. "What happened to all the nursing jobs." For the last few years all you read was that there will be a nursing shortage till, at least 2020. That getting a nursing job was as easy as shooting fish in a barrel. Articles were saying that even in a recession nursing would be immune because people still need healthcare.

So, what happened. Is it really the economy? Have all the vacancies been filled? What about the huge bonuses nurses were getting to sign with a hospital? Some of my own relatives got these bonuses so I know they were real. Now some of them are seeing their hours and benefits cut. Besides the recession (which is a big thing) are there other factors involved?

The nursing profession is starting to remind me of when they encouraged everyone to become programmers...and then the outsourcing began. You can't really outsource nursing, but it's the same situation. Encourage young people in droves to go into a profession, but then a few short years later the field dries up. It's a shame, really.

Ray

[worldtraveler]

Momology--Not exactly true. Many retired Boomer Friends my age retired from Ford, GM and GE and from my old home town, an old Northern industrial city , do in fact have a Pension, SS and some even maintain their company sponsored Health Insurance. They are in good shape. I would say many who have gotten layed off and are in their 50s are in deep trouble. And they are unable to find decent complete health Insurance at less then a $1000 monthly with or without prexisting conditions. Boomers I know 62 and over, already retired are doing OK.

[Ashley RN]

If you dont mind me asking where are you located? I am a new grad in desperate need of a job and willing to relocate anywhere...

thanks!

[Ashley RN]

lets not forget the expense for hiring new grads. it costs around 100,000 to train a new grad nurse and get them up to speed to perform nursing duties on there own for many places. I'm not sure where you are located but i am seeing improvements in the nursing job market where i live. I'm thinking that the economy is turning around or something because all of a sudden all the hospitals are having recruitment fairs galore. Even for the new grads!

If you don't mind me asking where are you located? I am a new grad who is desperately looking for a job and Im willing to relocate just about anywhere...

Thanks

[Canuck]

I live in Canada and we continue to hear the same thing about a nursing shortage. This holds true to the extent that there are going to be a large number of nurses who are currently in the front of the babyboom population retiring, thus creating even more jobs.

Yet, there's a cold reality that many Canadian nurses (and this may also hold true in other countries) don't realize is that there is no real nurse shortage. What there is, is a shortage of Full Time employment for nurses.

Many nurses have to work two or three part time jobs for several years just to equal the same amount of money as a Full Time job. This means working double shifts between their different employers. They do this to survive economically because they, like many others, have to eat and pay bills.

Many employers refuse to hire nurses as Full Time and there's a whole list of excuses that they will give. Let's use my municipal employer as an example. This municipal employer has a few Nursing Homes and the employment is 70% Part Time. Yet, over at the Police & Fire Departments the employment is 100% Full Time. Both Police & Fire Departments are male dominated workforces while Nurses and other health care workers are female dominated.

Sounds like discrimination to me.

I live and work in Ontario, Canada. At our hospital there is no shortage of FT employment...there's a shortage of nurses who are willing to work FT!!! Many of the young nurses opt to work PT for the greater flexibility and higher hourly rate (in lieu of benefits).

[scarred2NCLEX]

I have found that while doing my clinicals in one of our local hospitals on the med/surg floor, 2 out of the six nurses assigned to the one unit were part of a Bring Back program. Both of those nurses were house wives until their husbands lost their jobs. One had been out of the nursing field for 15 years. The other 8. they were placed in a 4 month program to bring their skills up to todays date. Now they both work full time and the one's husband has now assumed the role of homeschool Dad.

I have been in management for the staffing and homehealth business for the past 12 years. The last 2 were the most difficult and fortunately, it was during that time I was going to school for nursing. The staffing/ home health has been hit tremendously and the work has just diminished. This also has created less jobs as those employees who would work agency have now gone and taken the perm positions at the hospitals and LTC for security. .. I remember just 3 years ago we were offering $1000 for referring 2 people who worked 10 shifts. That was the requirements cause we had so much work we didn't have the people. Now, we have frozen our application process for sometime.

The good news is, it won't be like this always. I think that those who have lived long enough that have seen the cycle are correct. Between 1-5 yrs there will be a turn around.

[SENSUALBLISSINFL, BSN, RN]

Nursing jobs being outsourced? Wow, I never heard that but after reading the post it makes sense. People go to other countries to have cosmetic procedures because it cost less. Uhmm....how about all the thousands of nurses brought over from other countries, like the Philipines, to fill in for the nursing shortage? So now, there are no jobs for the new grads, I wonder if there is any other country that will take them? I will be starting my fourth semester, with four more to go (part - time track), in a career I always wanted, that I feel is my calling and that one should have a vocation to do, and I am finding myself with the prospect of not getting hired when I graduate, kind of sucks... but I need to keep a positive attitude that it will get better. I am willing to move within the states, should I consider now moving to another country that will take me?

[kellyskitties]

I know at our facility, the openings ARE there, but they aren't where new grads want to start. Nobody wants to start on med/surg anymore, so we have openings there more than any other floors. ER has openings, but I think the consensus has become that it's nearly impossible for an already overworked nurse in that shortstaffed environment to train the new grad without eating them.

Are the jobs there, just not in the more glamorized areas like OB, ICU, ER or are there shortages in all fields? I hear lots of new grads say they WILL NOT do med/surg. Maybe this will cause more to change their ideals. Not to mention, a year on m/s can open more of those glamorous doors, all the while getting the bills paid.

I also think some of the money new grads expect is based on rumors or maybe a few factual jobs, that get filled so fast there's not much way a new grad could land one. Don't expect to start on top, but you can earn your way to it.

[Ashley RN]

I know at our facility, the openings ARE there, but they aren't where new grads want to start. Nobody wants to start on med/surg anymore, so we have openings there more than any other floors. ER has openings, but I think the consensus has become that it's nearly impossible for an already overworked nurse in that shortstaffed environment to train the new grad without eating them.

Are the jobs there, just not in the more glamorized areas like OB, ICU, ER or are there shortages in all fields? I hear lots of new grads say they WILL NOT do med/surg. Maybe this will cause more to change their ideals. Not to mention, a year on m/s can open more of those glamorous doors, all the while getting the bills paid.

I also think some of the money new grads expect is based on rumors or maybe a few factual jobs, that get filled so fast there's not much way a new grad could land one. Don't expect to start on top, but you can earn your way to it.

Thats not at all what is going on here...there are very few positions at all whether it be in med/surg or in specialized units...take some time to read through the threads....

for example I started working as an Nursing Assistant during nursing school and after I graduated I applied for a job at that hospital (where I also had one of my clinical rotations) there was 650 applicants they filtered them down to 100 through phone interviews then took the 100 and did group panel interviews scored the people and sent 30-40 of the highest scoring new grad applicants to the units to be interviewed by the nurse managers. I didn't get past the panel interview because I didn't answer one of the questions as fully as possible which decreased my overall score for the interview. Then they hired 7 new grads for the entire hospital....and wont hire any new grads again for 6-8 months

I applied to another Med/ surge position at a smaller hospital in San Francisco and when I called the nurse recruiter to inquire about my application she told me that they had 1...uno...ONE position and 790 applicants and I was number 679!! They are really not hiring new grads...if you read through the other threads you will see that the people are not asking for high paying specialize positions they are asking for positions PERIOD! I am now a licensed RN with my BSN working as a Nursing Assistant so I am not above working my way up I just need somewhere to start.

Sorry for the rant but it is really upsetting to go to school for 6 years working full time to put myself through school only to get out and not be able to find a job. I have applied for licenses two other states as well and have had no luck...I dont know what to do and now I have had to start paying back student loans and can barely afford to....its a bad situation.

[hbgwan, LPN, LVN]

lets not forget the expense for hiring new grads. it costs around 100,000 to train a new grad nurse and get them up to speed to perform nursing duties on there own for many places. I'm not sure where you are located but i am seeing improvements in the nursing job market where i live. I'm thinking that the economy is turning around or something because all of a sudden all the hospitals are having recruitment fairs galore. Even for the new grads!

where do you live?

[kellyskitties]

I was only saying what I see where I am. We are a small rural hospital - using more LPN's than RN's just to keep pts taken care of. Many of our LPNs are in school working toward their RN's. We have a few openings in the "specialized" fields (I consider M/S a specialty by the way), but the new grads will almost always try for those over the M/S openings. We do have openings, and we take new grads, but many of our new our areas new grads want only the "specialty" areas or will go to a larger (which translates to better in their minds) facility chasing more money or what sounds like a better job to them.

I feel for new grads that went into nursing for the right reasons and still can't get a job. Don't give up, many places still need you. We need you. Maybe some of you do or do not consider rural facilities, but if you don't, then broaden your horizons and look for places you can at least get some experience with. That will help your odds at places you want to apply with.

I hear the jobs are shrinking, but we haven't seen it yet. The new nurses go to the bigger facilities around us, and only a few consider us. Even though are actually a sister facility to a bigger facility that gets the grads.

I hate to hear a new grad working as a CNA, not that a CNA job is beneath anyone, but that's not the best use of your license.

I'm really not trying to offend anyone, just trying to offer ideas.

[hecallsmeDuchess]

Hi Kelly, what state do you live in? I'm so willing to relocate to any state that I can find a job in. I will be graduating in May and as much as I'd love to start in OB(which is my passion), I also have the sense to know that it might not happen straight after graduation. Like Ashely said, some of us new people just want a foot in door, an opportunity, a job where we can practice and make the best of use of our license. I know most people don't want to do Med-Surg but I don't know anyone who would chose joblessness instead of working a unit that might not be in their top 5. The thing is that there is slowness in the hiring process and it is frustrating for us new people but I still refuse to lose hope.

@Ashley, have you tried applying at a LTC facility? A friend of mine just a got a job at one and of all the lot of them that applied, only two were hired and what gave them an edge was that they were CNAs before they became RNs. Goodluck to you in your search.

[Fiona59]

The sky-rocketing cost of healthcare has dictated that cut-backs have had to happen...so workload, patient ratios etc. have all changed. The much publicized and much feared nursing shortage has caused a shift in the way healthcare delivers and has caused a re-thinking of "the right person in the right position". Now we have a huge influx of RPNs or nurse's aides or whatever they are called in each juristiction. The degree nurse is being squeezed out at either end....the advanced practice nurses at the top and the RPNs at the bottom. The degree nurse has become a 'sandwich generation' unto itself. The nursing profession did it to themselves....wasn't everything all right prior to the mandatory entry-level bachelor's degree? No talk of a shortage then..... The shortage came about when enrollment plummetted for the degree nursing programs. I mean who wanted to go to school for 4 years to do bed-side nursing? Enter the age of the RPN...still a quick 2 year program, good pay and all the benefits and fulfillment of direct patient care. Advanced practice clinicians have soared to new heights with lot's of autonomy and good remumeration. That leaves the "basic RN" out in the cold.... without a job.

Registered Practical Nurses exist only in Ontario. In the rest of the country they are LPNs. There is a huge difference between an LPN and nurse's aide.

To a certain extent you are correct in saying the degree entry for RN has caused the effect we are experiencing in Canada. I see it with the hospital and diploma trained RNs I work with and the attitude of the BScN holders. All in all they are both RNs who had to pass CRNE to work. I've seen too many of the degree students come through acute care with the attitude that floor work is only for clinicals, management is where they want to be. Provincial Nursing Colleges such as CARNA have supported this ideology with their ads and sense of arrogance when dealing with the media.

Nurses unions which exclude LPNs in the bulk of the country, have bargained hard and fast in many areas of the country when the economy was in great shape and have basically priced the RN out of many jobs. A bit of an own goal don't you think. RNs max out at around $42/hr while LPNs top off at $27/hr in my province. If you were an employer wouldn't you change the staffing ratio when you have to deal with mess of the provincial health budgets.

The LPNs aren't happy with it either. More and more is being dumped on their shoulders without rising compensation and nobody asks them if they want to assume the additional work and responsibility. They also aren't happy that a fresh, new RN grad is paid more than an experienced LPN (who often does the orientation of said new RN).

Dr. Duckitt in Alberta has a lot to answer for. So does CNA who has monkeyed around with the future of nursing in Canada while holding their cards close to their chest on the future of Canadian RN, PN, and Pyschiatric Nurse education.

In Alberta, the two year PN diploma is not a quick and easy two years. It is basically the old diploma programme that was scrapped in 2009 (last diploma grads). From what I hear Ontario is going the same route.