“The Global Nursing Shortage: An Overview of Issues and Actions” mentions how the global shortage of nurses is impacting the healthcare system around the world and what the International Council of Nurses (ICN) is doing to find a solution. The ICN was found in 1899 and is the world’s largest and first organization for health professionals (Oulton, 2006). Their goal is to ensure proper nursing care is given to all, logical health policies are in place globally, the development of nursing knowledge, and the presence of a respected and competent workforce. The ICN’s solution to the nursing shortage is organized into five policy interventions: macroeconomics and health sector funding, workforce planning and policy (including regulation), positive practice environments, …show more content…
There needs to be strong alliances between nursing and a broad range of stakeholders, as it can further improve growth and strengthen national nursing organizations. Moving on to workforce policy and planning, nurses need to be involved in the planning of the workforce and a better practice guideline for planning should be made. The supply of nurses needs to redistribute because currently, there are large clusters of nurses in urban areas and few in rural areas. That is a problem because, in most countries, a large portion of the population lives in rural areas and those individuals are neglected. Nurses can also use an image campaign to help the public understand what nurses do and to draw in potential recruits along with patients. In order to make the most out of nurses, education should be provided and the role of nurses should be expanded until the workforce shortage is addressed long term. Nurses should be allowed to attend policy meeting, especially when the government plans how to get the most out of healthcare spending. All of nursing needs to work together and have a united voice if progress will be made on key
Many health care professionals are wondering why shortage transpired when managed care cost initiatives, implemented throughout the country, are dramatically decreasing the length of patient stays (Upenieks, 2003). In fact, such a situation should be resulting in a nursing oversupply. As the nursing shortage ensues, the need for recruiting and retaining highly skilled nurses committed to the organization will become necessary to maintain high-quality patient care. The recent national nurse shortage has resulted in higher nurse workloads; fewer support resources, greater nursing dissatisfaction, and burnout, making it more difficult to provide optimal patient care (Upenieks, 2003). The primary role of nursing is to provide the best possible care to patients.
The nursing shortage is divided into four different categories. The four categories are as follows; "willing nurse" shortage, funding or perceived funding shortage, shortage of understanding that nurses are needed to deliver care, and nurse education and empowerment shortages (What is the nursing shortage and why does it exist?., 18 October, 2007). To be able to repair this major problem, all four segments of shortages need to be addressed. The first nursing shortage, A "willing nurse" shortage, is the simple fact of not enough supply to fill the demand of nursing positions. This shortage occurs either because there are simply not enough nurses to fill the open positions, or because experienced nurses are opting out of nursing and the willingness to provide care due to the current occupational environment. The second nursing shortage is the funding or perceived funding shortage. This shortage is merely due to nurses not feeling as if they are being compensat...
... & Abrahamson, K. (2009). A critical examination of the U.S. nursing shortage: contributing factors, public policy implications. Nursing Forum, 44(4), 235-244. doi:10.1111/j.1744-6198.2009.00149.x
The risk for patient health has been increasing while the nurse staffing levels are decreasing, throughout the world patient care is at risk due to the shortage of staffing in the nursing industry. Many, including the nurses who are being greatly impacted by this situation believe that changes need to be made to increase nurse staffing levels to better the lives of every individual involved in such a massive problem that can affect many innocent lives. Although, some might argue against finding a solution to the problem and bettering the staffing levels by stating that the nursing field doesn’t have a low employment rate and is projected to grow in the near future, however, the situation remains to be impacting nurses and patients in negative
The nursing shortage most likely does not mean a great deal to people until they are in the care of a nurse. The United States is in a severe nursing shortage with no relief in sight due to many factors compounding the problem and resulting in compromised patient care and nurse burnout. Nursing shortages have been experienced in the past by the United States and have been overcome with team effort. However, the current shortage is proving to be the most complex and great strides are being made to defeat the crisis before it becomes too difficult to change. Researchers anticipate that by 2010, the United States will need almost one million more registered nurses than will be available (Cherry & Jacob, 2005, p. 30).
There are several factors that are considered the causes of the nursing shortage. Literature suggests that the shortage is linked to factors related to current population trends and the nature of the health care e...
Health care reform has been a major issue over the past decade. The Nursing industry has in particular experienced a period of unpredictable change. On Dec 24, 2009, a landmark measure was passed in the senate by a vote of 60 to 39. This decision to pass the health care reform will change America forever. Nurses will constitute the largest single group of health care professionals. They will have a huge impact on quality and effectiveness in health care. The nursing industry will help hold this new program together by acting as the glue (The nursing industry will be the glue holding the new health care in tact.) It is estimated that by 2015 the number of nurses will need to increase to over 4 million. Nurses are the backbone of the health care industry thus creating better polices for this profession will help ease the workload and high demand. A nurse’s main concern is always to insure quality care and the safety of their patients. Under the new health care reform several new measures have been set into place to ease the transition and improve the quality of care for all patients. One program is designed to fund scholarships and loan programs to offset the high costs of education. Nursing shortages and the high turnover has become a serious epidemic. Health care reform is supposed going to solve many of these problems.
Healthcare is a continuous emerging industry across the world. With our ever changing life styles and the increased levels of pollution across the world more and more people are suffering from various health issues. Nursing is an extremely diverse profession and among the highest educated with several levels ranging from a licensed practical nurse (LPN) to a registered nurse (RN) on up to a Doctorate in Nursing. Diane Viens (2003) states that ‘The NP is a critical member of the workforce to assume the leadership roles within practice, education, research, health systems, and health policy’.
Nursing has always been a key career in the health care system. Although it is not often focused on media and stories surrounding health care, nursing is a career of great importance. If any patient was asked about their experience at a hospital or a care center, many would mention the capability and care that they received from the nurses. The health care system could not function efficiently, if at all, if nurses were not present to perform their part. Nurses are more than just physicians, support staff.
Since the 1990’s, the interest in nursing and the profession as a whole has decreased dramatically and is still expected to do so over the next 10-15 years according to some researchers. With this nursing shortage, many factors are affected. Organizations have to face challenges of low staffing, higher costs for resources, recruiting and reserving of registered nurses, among liability issues as well. Some of the main issues arising from this nurse shortage are the impact of quality and continuity of care, organizational costs, the effect it has on nursing staff, and etc. However, this not only affects an organization and community, but affects the nurses the same. Nurses are becoming overwhelmed and are questioning the quality of care that each patient deserves. This shortage is not an issue that is to be taken lightly. The repercussions that are faced by both nurses and the organization are critical. Therefore, state funding should be implemented to private hospitals in order to resolve the shortage of nurses. State funds will therefore, relieve the overwhelming burdens on the staff, provide a safe and stress free environment for the patient, and allow appropriate funds needed to keep the facility and organization operational.
The prolonged shortage of skilled nursing personnel has been a serious concern to the healthcare industry, and this shortage has impacted the quality of care delivery. In addition, nursing turnover has also exacerbated the problem of nursing shortage. Nursing shortage has been blamed on many nurses retiring and less younger nurses joining the occupation. There is also an increase in life expectancy (baby boomers) leading an increase in both physical and mental ailment with subsequent demand in nursing care. Nurses are also leaving nursing profession because of inadequate staffing, tense work environment, negative press about the profession, and inflexible work schedules. Even though nursing is a promising career and offers job security, the
The shortage occurred in the United States and other continents like Asia and Africa. During this time, some of the nursing positions were cut because of the managed care demands that curtailed both the private and public sector about the issue of insurance reimbursement rates in most of the hospitals (MacLean et al., 2014). Most of the decision-makers in the hospitals did not have a good understanding of the issue of nursing, and they implemented plans that increased the workloads of the individual registered nurses. Currently, the nurses that remain underpowered lack professional resources of fighting efficiently against the
Solutions for the nursing shortage beyond implementing safe nurse staffing ratios include: ongoing long-term workforce planning; institution of an education and practice system to promote more equitable compensation in the health care community based on a better understanding of the educational preparation required for different health care roles; implementation of specific strategies to retain experienced nurses in the provision of direct patient care, investigating the potential for using technological advances to enhance the capacity of a reduced nursing workforce; and advocate for increased nursing education funding under Title VIII of the Public Health Service Act and other publicly funded initiatives to improve
Like all professions and disciplines, nursing is influenced by, and must respond to global trends needs, challenges, and opportunities. These strategies will influence and shape the future of the nursing community and health care nationally and internationally. Also in a global committee health care exhibit problems some of which are political, educational, educational, nursing , environment and social issues. Therefore, improving and achieving health in a global community is of great concern to the nursing profession. Hence, “health and healing varies across countries and culture, the pursuit of healthy individuals and communities is a universal goal” (Jacobsen, 2008, p. 1). Nurses can be advocate, educator, counselor as well as an advocate to this society.
Several years ago in 2008 the RWJF and the IOM collaborated for two years to discern the future needs of the nursing profession. Most importantly, the objective was to outline the critical actions needed to ensure nursing was ready to seamlessly move towards the future. This was no easy task as nurses work in such diverse settings such as outpatient areas, acute care settings, the community, and long term settings to name a few. Couple this with the fact that nurses have a variety of educational avenues such as the associates, diploma, or bachelor’s degree open to them to achieve the status of registered nurse (Institute of Medicine, 2010). All of this considered, the committee did design four key messages regarding the future of nursing as key in the transformation of health care as evidenced in their "Future of Nursing" report.