Nursing Shortage In America

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In todays society nursing shortage is not new to America in fact it has always been a problem but it has been a problem that has always been overcome. Nurses make up the largest component of hospital staff which they are the primary providers of patient care becoming an important essential in our daily life. Nurses shortage has risen dramatically across the years negatively impacting our health care due to work over load, low salary, and dissatisfaction of their job. Nursing shortage has become a major issue in the United States, with a declining amount of nurses, and a hospital industry that is constantly expanding, the need for nurses is rapidly growing. According to the “united states registered workforce report card and shortage…show more content…
One of the reasons contributing to nurses shortages is approximately one third of the nursing workforce is over 50 years of age and the average age of full time nursing facility is 49 years. According to a study published in July 2000, it predicted that 40% of nurses by 2010 will be 50 years of age or older. (Buerhaus, 2000) In order to overcome this problem the recruit of younger nurses is required and to gain more nurses student’s government is helping nursing schools by providing grants will supplement faculty pay so that schools do not have to compete with hospitals for qualified nurses. Many hospital systems have contributed into recruiting students by helping with scholarships and grants. For example in San Diego, six hospital systems have committed $1.3 million to support a program called “Nurses Now” which is a program that will provide an increase of available slots for nursing applicants San Diego University (Kucher, 2000). In order for the nursing field to obtain more students it is also useful to have campagins advertising that career. In February…show more content…
Job Satisfication has become a issue in the nursing career because many nurses feel unappreciated and stressed. To help compensate for the shortage many nurses are putting in extra hours on scheduled days off and working over schedule on regular workdays. Mostly all the nurses have to take care of patients in a hospital 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. According to a Nursing Economic issue Dr peter Buerhaus and his colleagues found that more than 75% of RNs believe that nursing shortage presents a major problem for the quality of their work life, 98% presented stress, and 93% nurses would leave the profession (buerhaus). With nurses being overwhelmed with work and also stress they are not having enough time to communicate with their patients or showing their all attention to them. Patients will begin to feel less satisfication with their care and nurse. Most nurses have children that they need to provide care to also but with overwhelming work load and the busy schedules sometimes it is impossible to see them. Many prefer spending time with their family and children instead of choosing work. Nurses are mostly known for their long hours and low

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