Now is the Time to Become a Nurse

• There are always employment opportunities
• Credentials are easily portable within the USA
• Incredibly wide range of work including entrepreneurial opportunities
• Many different work schedules
• Advancement with experience or education
• Good salary
• Work is rewarding - A nurse can make a difference in the lives of others
• The community respects a nurse

Supply and Demand

Background and Need
The current lack of registered nurses (RNs) in west central Ohio has created a crisis. The supply and demand for nurses have periodically been very uneven. Approximately every 10 years, the demand for nurses surpasses the supply enough to bring national attention. Between periods of great demand have been times when positions for RNs were scarcer. A quick look at supply and demand demonstrates that a shortage of RNs currently exists and is projected to last for many years, peaking in 2010.

Does Ohio have a nursing shortage? Yes, and it is getting worse!

Facts about Supply
The number of new licenses issued by the Ohio Board of Nursing indicates a severe decline over the last ten years. In 1995, there were 4,456 new RN licenses issued in Ohio. In 2003, there were 3,060, a disconcerting 31% decrease.

The average age of nurses in Ohio is 47 [versus 44.3 years nationally, according to the Bureau of Health Professions Division of Nursing].

Baccalaureate nursing enrollment in Ohio decreased 62% over the past six years.

Experts estimate 40 percent of the current corps of nurses across the country will retire within 10 years (Buerhaus, 1999).

Problem: Background and Need

Facts about Demand
An aging population is contributing to the demand for more nurses. Health care needs are known to be greater as citizens age. The Health Resources and Services Administration predicts the proportion of Ohioans over age 65 will grow 34% by 2020. This is in addition to 30% growth in this age group from 1980 to 2000. Ohio’s situation is already more acute than the nation as a whole. In 2000, 13.5% of the population in Ohio was 65 years of age or older, compared to 12.6% in the U.S.

Educators and health planners see the growing demand for nurses not only as a need for additional personnel but also for additional education, with more nurses prepared in baccalaureate programs that emphasize leadership, patient education, case management, and care across a variety of acute care and outpatient settings. Graduateprepared RNs with advanced practice skills to provide both acute and primary care are also needed for our future health care systems (AACN, 1999).

While sicker patients who require more attention are driving the growing demand for nurses in hospitals, opportunities for nurses are also increasing in other settings. Newfacilities such as outpatient surgery centers, clinics and physicians’ offices, as well as increased demand for nurses in administrative jobs, such as with insurance companies, compete with hospitals for nurses.

Ohio law changes have led to a competing demand for master’s degree prepared nurses between advanced practice and nursing education programs.

The costs for health care providers associated with the nursing shortage are phenomenal. All of the recruitment costs (e.g. advertisements an bonuses) buy short-term gains and divert dollars that could be used for work place enhancement that would have long-term returns.

When Franciscan Hospital closed in July 2000, the newly available nurses did not begin to solve the service area’s nursing shortage problem. Just as nurses were dispersed to other hospitals, so too were the patients.

As an example of the extreme service area needs, two hospitals, unable to meet their nursing staffing needs, have recruited nurses from the Philippines.

Contributing Factors

Recently schools of nursing reported an increase in enrollments. However, declining enrollments and fewer graduates over several previous years translates into fewer nurses in thebr educational pipeline.

The total population of registered nurses is growing at the slowest rate in 20 years at 5.4% (as of 2000). Fewer new nurses are entering the profession and the average age of the RN is climbing.

A shortage of qualified nursing school faculty is a key factor in restricting nursing program enrollments.

Changing demographics signal a need for more nurses to care for our aging population.

Job burnout and dissatisfaction are driving nurses to leave the profession.

Providers from around the country are reporting growing difficulty recruiting nurses.