While America has been laying off its workers, hospitals have been hiring them. Though there has always been a shortage of nurses in American hospitals, the current vacancy rate, 16.3% as noted by the American Health Care Association in 2008, is the worst reported since the sixties. This shortage, according to Health Affairs, a policy journal, started about a decade ago in 1998 and peaked in 2001 with an average vacancy rate of 13%. The same researchers have extrapolated that the shortage will grow to 260,000 registered nurses in the next fifteen years, as baby boomers grow older and need additional medical care.

The nursing shortage itself has been driving nurses out of the workforce. Dissatisfaction with long hours and understaffing has caused many nurses to look into alternate employment opportunities. This has exacerbated the problem even further, as the nurses that make it through crowded nursing schools don’t necessarily enter hospitals after graduation.

Lay offs and cut backs are sending these nurses back to hospitals. Because of the hazards of employment in other fields, many nurses are deciding to stay in hospitals, thankful to be working at all. Sadly, the recession may be responsible for the filling in of the nursing shortage in the short term, since nurses of retirement age are forced to continue working in order to provide income and health benefits for their families. Long term effects will doubtlessly show a shortage increase again when these nurses are finally able to resign.

Researchers are finding that the nursing shortage has decreased slightly, as nurses reenter the workforce, and current nurses work more hours to increase pay and work for years rather than retiring, due to spouse’s lost job and a lack of health insurance. This could actually conclude the nursing shortage in some parts of the United States, as small towns and rural areas are hardest hit by the shortage.

Almost 250,000 nurses entered hospitals and health care facilities last year, increasing the number of nurses in the workforce by more than any other year in the last two decades, according to Health Affairs. For example, Truman Medical Centers has seen a 13% drop in vacancy rates from 20% to 7% in the last year alone. By applying efficient recruitment, retention policies and acceptance of online nursing degree programs, other hospitals could experience similar results.

The recession favors older nurses over young nurses, which can be disappointing for new graduates. Though positions in hospitals are open, many administrators prefer experienced workers, and will wait to hire a nurse reentering the field, rather than a new nurse on his or her first assignment. These hires will eventually find placements, but the process may take longer than they had originally expected based on the economic climate.

This is only a temporary fix for the long-term nursing shortage, as about 125,000 of the nurses entering the workforce in the last year are over 50 years old, and only 30% between 21 and 34. Also adding to the short-term influx is the effect of advertisements in other countries. Almost twice as many nurses are foreign born today compared to the numbers from twenty years ago, and 10% of these foreign born nurses moved to the United States in the years since the shortage peaked.

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Due to the age of the baby boomers, in the next ten years, there will be more need than ever for trained nurses. Additionally, there has been an 18% growth in population, adding an even greater number of patients to a hospital’s workload. Yet an ever-increasing number of qualified applicants to nursing schools are being denied as a result of the lack of faculty and resources.

Furthermore, nurses are dissatisfied with their work and environment, and more nurses are leaving the profession than entering. The average age of nurses is growing steadily, pushing the mean towards nurses on the verge of retirement. This causes an immediate deficit in addition to the gap already expected.

Within ten years, statisticians have calculated the nursing shortage may increase to over one million. The Nurse Training and Retention Act would counteract this shortage, providing a program that would help keep current nurses in the workforce while drawing in new nurses.

The Act would achieve funding by awarding Department of Labor grants to hospitals and programs that propose further training for healthcare workers. This would help lower healthcare workers gain the training to become nurses, and would help current nurses climb the corporate ladder to nursing faculty by allowing them the opportunity to finance higher education. This program would be even more effective with the increased acceptance of virtual training whereby prospective students could attend online nursing schools in their free time without having to leave their day job.

The nurse Training and Retention Act is effective because it targets those most likely to become nurses: those already working in healthcare. These workers are skilled in the area, have an interest in medicine, and many lack only the degree needed to perform nursing procedures. Healthcare workers necessitate lessened time in orientation due to experience; funding these workers will lessen the strain placed on nurses by adding to the workforce quickly and effectively. After becoming nurses, these workers are known to be better acquainted with a medical environment, and respond to patient needs more rapidly than nurses straight from school.

When nurses are better satisfied in their job, they are likely to work harder and more effectively. The benefits trickle down to the patients: a well-staffed and happy workforce is less apt to make avoidable mistakes in the treatment of patients. By providing scholarships and grants to help the next generation of nurses, hospitals and government can act against the nursing shortage. An attractive job environment compounded with satisfied employees in one of the only remaining American industries experiencing growth is one of the best advertisements for becoming a nurse.

However, the Nurse Training and Retention Act of 2007 ended in referral to a committee. Due to the time of introduction, the bill was cleared at the end of the Congress session. Senator Durbin has reintroduced the bill in 2009, and New York Representative Carolyn McCarthy has submitted a similar bill. Both are being discussed in committee.

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