By Anthony Balderrama, www.TheWorkBuzz.com, CareerBuilder's job seeker blog
In case you hadn't heard, there's a debate about health care going on in this country right now. I don't imagine any of you are unaware because you can't read or watch anything without hearing about the debate. Regardless of where you stand on the issue, we're all going to face a predicament: People are living longer than they did generations ago, the amount of baby boomers who will need medical care is huge, and the amount of nurses is inadequate. And if the show Scrubs is to be believed, there will be even less time for zany antics during this shortage!PBS reran the episode "Nurses Needed" of its documentary program Now. Although it originally aired last fall, the facts remain the same. (At the end of the segment, producers do catch up with a featured patient to see how she's doing one year later.) By 2020, the country could have a shortage of nurses nearing 500,000 or even 1 million.
Look at this study on nursing from the Department of Health and Human Services. In 2000, the amount of full-time equivalent (FTE) licensed nurses was 1,891,000. The demand for FTE licensed nurses was 2,001,500. By 2020, there will be fewer FTE licensed nurses at just 1,808,000. Yet the demand will rise to 2,824,900.
A lack of nurses can translate into less attention spent with each patient, the program points out, and studies have proven that too many patients per nurse can negatively affect medical care. With fewer nurses in hospitals and other health-care facilities, the amount of patients per nurse will continue to grow. The program also explains that fewer nurses are choosing to teach due to low salaries, therefore adversely affecting the number of new nurses. And many nurses are choosing to work for pharmaceutical companies because the pay can be substantially higher than hospitals, emergency rooms, clinics and many other health care facilities.
If nursing appeals to you–and it's not an easy job, so it's definitely not for everyone–this could be the right time to look into it. The demand for nurses will only increase in the coming decades, so you'll be in demand. Depending on where you decide to work, wages can vary. Here are some median annual salary figures from CBSalary.com to give you an idea:
- Registered nurse: $66,427
- Intensive care unit (ICU) nurse: $67,548
- Head nurse: $85,967
- Critical care unit (CCU) nurse: $67,016
- Nurse midwife: $98,008
- Home-care nurse: $65,507
(Salaries vary by location, of course. And there are many other nursing options available.)
Next: 6 Healthcare Jobs Explained >>
Nov 5th 2009 @ 5:22PM Regina
As a former ICU nurse in a privately owned hospital I understand exactly why there is a nursing shortage. When there are staff shortages in your unit you are expected to just handle it, it doesn't matter if your nurses already have 3 patients each and the acuity is overwhelming. As long as there is a bed open you are expected to fill it. It doesn't matter if the patients you already have are being ignored or endangered because you cannot take care of everyones needs. And the management certainly are not going to miss a meeting to help out because that would make them look incompetent. So if someone is injured or dies it is your ass on the line. As a nurse you should not go home at night wishing you had more time because you knew your patients deserved better care than they received.
Reply
Nov 14th 2009 @ 7:30AM Eugenio F. Vargas
Nurses are some ot the hardest working individuals in the healthcare realm and most of the time their work is underappreciated. As a nurse you are the crucial link between the patient and the rest of the medical team(doctors, respiratory therapists, physical therapists, Xray technicians, social workers, administrators). As a nurse you spend more time with the patient than anyone else. As you well know not only do you have to care for the patient, you also have to tend to all that paperwork (or nowadays computer charting) that is part of your work. If a patient is in crisis your are usually the first contact that will initiate the urgent measures to control the situation. If a patient or their family are angry or upset you are most of the time the first one to recieve the brunt of their discontent.
I admire and greatly apreciate the time, effort and dedication that nurses have for their patients and their work. THANK YOU. As a practicing neurosurgeon I apreciate your work every single day.
Nov 14th 2009 @ 7:48AM Rob
Regina,
As a parent of 2 special needs children (one spent 38 days on ECMO as a baby) and then trached two years later, we got to see what you mentioned. What I have to say is that every day I look at my daughter's picture or see her at her facility; I thank God everyday for people like yourself that inspite all these challenges you do you best and give of yourself. Thank you and God Bless You and the many that daily push though these odds.
Nov 14th 2009 @ 7:48AM Rob
Also, I don't think you guys make enough either! Thank you very much again for your service!
Nov 14th 2009 @ 8:34AM TaWana
Regina, very well spoken, and all soooooooooooooooo true!Sad but true and the pay is not enough for the stress!!!!!!
Nov 14th 2009 @ 8:37AM Diana
Exactly Regina. No one in these studies talks about the horrible working conditions for nurses, including the short staffing, mandated overtime, and the verbal abuse from doctors, patients and families. (And sometimes co-workers who tend to turn on each other to vent frustration.) And sometimes physical abuse.
A great number of nurses are so fed up with 12 hour shifts where you are lucky to get a chance to pee, much less eat anything, and running so frantically you are in constant fear you are going to miss something that harms someone and jeopardizes your license. Then go home and take hours to decompress from the extreme stress.
It simply isn't worth it anymore. To those who are impressed by the high wages, I say this: the pay is that high for a reason. And there is STILL a shortage. That should tell you something.
Nov 14th 2009 @ 8:45AM Edwin Smith, RN
Good God, do I agree with you. I worked for 40 years, have paid my dues and did it all. For the past 20 years I was in administration, ha, you should work there, its terrible knowing what you have to do is not the best thing to do but.............I feel I protected the patient and nurses as best as I could. So glad to be retired because of an MI..........
Nov 14th 2009 @ 8:49AM miki
This is so true. There is no 'nursing shortage'; there is a group of hospitals that are not STAFFING their units.
I have worked both the medical as well as psychiatric side of health care. We have constant cuts in staffing which lead to increased patient responsibility.
The articles on nursing shortages are a cloak and dagger covering for the truth in medical care.
Nov 14th 2009 @ 9:17AM Donna
I've been an RN for 15 years working in ICU, ER, and cath lab. My salary has just barely reached 62,000/yr. For the work load and stress level I have, not to mention my skill level, I should be making a lot more. It's impossible to take care of patients the way you want to or was taught in school. The unreal patient care load, paperwork, computer work, and lack of good support staff such as CNA's does not allow nurses to provide care to patients that is expected by the pencil pushing administration that, themselves, is very out of touch of bedside nursing. And to the nurse "ME", I am not lazy! You sound like one of the many nurses that come on shift and sit and goof off and you probably leave a lot undone for the next nurse coming on. A lot of nurses who work OT, do the bare minimum (because they are exhausted) and leave a lot for the oncoming nurse to clean up. Many times I spend a couple hours at the beginning of my shift doing things that should have been done by the previous shift nurse.
Nov 14th 2009 @ 9:22AM Carolyn
My thoughts are with you every step; the frustration of balancing the quality of care and preserving your own health is overwehlming. The endless shifts of overtime; the lack of proper support when lifting patients; the condescending attitude of the adminisration and physicians when things aren't done. I eventually ruptured a disc trying to complete the backbreaking pace of each day. The safety of the patients was always on my mind. But the bottom line always prevailed.....keep the beds full and the census up at all costs.
Nov 14th 2009 @ 9:22AM Loree
Regina, you are 100% right. Thats why there is a shortage of nurse's. If the profession would make some changes, the problem would be fixed. Most people become nurses to help patients and get frustrated shortly after realizing that as a nurse you dont have time to give patients that help. Although I love being a nurse, I could not tolerate giving sub standard care. I am a home health nurse which allows me to give one on one care to my patients. I find at the end of the day I feel like I made a difference.
Nov 14th 2009 @ 9:25AM Diana
And I just want to say...ALL nurses need to unionize. For ourselves, AND for the sake of our patients, whose care is compromised by unsafe ratios.
Nov 14th 2009 @ 9:46AM Jayne chandler
This is so very true !!
Nov 14th 2009 @ 9:45AM Jane Finn RN, BSN
You are so right Regina! It is time for upper management in our Health Care Systems to take pay cuts to better afford more nurses and provide a safer patient-nurse staff ratio and thence a much more improved health care outcome for patients. I have spent the last half of my life as a nurse(over thirty years)as both a staff and managerial RN and certainly have experienced the overwhelming staffing shortages on both ends of the nursing jobs! Improving staffing needs to become the PRIORITY if we ever expect our health care to improve!
Nov 14th 2009 @ 9:55AM Beeks
cry baby - get a new job
Nov 14th 2009 @ 9:57AM Orvil
As a nurse for the last ten years I can say without a doubt this comment is the truth. As a floor nurse it is even worse the nurses there are asked to care for 5 to 10 patients with conditions that can change for the worse in an instant. To make matters worse nurses are forced to care more for their charting (not charted not done)than their patients. Things are going to get worse until deaths pile up and then administration and the government will of course play the blame game as they always have and this to will fall on the nurses as if they had a choice. Nurses are paid a set rate and are billed to the patients and insurance companies no differently then a utility. In short there is no better electricity in one room than another, there is no better water, so there cannot be a difference in nurses or patients right. I mean we are all human right what is the difference for someone being treated for a cat bite and a person being treated for a massive heart attack or stroke? According to the hositals and insurance companies nothing. So in short to you nurses just deal with it at least you have a job and to all those wanting to join the ranks. Bring lots of lube because over the course of your entire career you are going to get screwed its the nature of the buisness.
Nov 14th 2009 @ 8:12PM baeb
Spent 50 ywars as an RM, 37 of them inICU/CCu and the shortage of nurses has always been, Things haven't changedin 50 years.Nurses have never been paid a descent salary, so I say AMEN to your comments.
Nov 14th 2009 @ 10:30AM Ray
I agree with Regina..... I work in the ED at a Veterans Hospital. Our new director wants "Disney Model" way of doing things. There is no such thing in a high stress environment like the ED.
RJR
Nov 14th 2009 @ 11:02AM jj
Absolutely the truth!!!!!!!!!!!!
Nov 14th 2009 @ 4:01PM Cristie
I completely agree with you. I have been an RN for 12 years, and I have watched people that I graduated with leave nursing like lemmings on a cliff! It seems they can't get out fast enough. Those who aren't leaving are becoming the hard, leathery nurses that are angry because they can't possibley do what is necessary for the patients they have, much less the ones that are coming in the door! I, personally, have changed my specialty and am pursuing my master's degree as a nurse anesthetist. One patient, one nurse! And great pay!