If you’re like me, you look for good news about the nursing profession. We finally received some good news from researchers tracking the registered nurse (RN) workforce! In a recent study by Auerbach et al. (2024), we are finally seeing an improvement in RN numbers and nurses under the age of 35 are leading that growth. In addition, nurses between the age of 35 to 49 years are 38% of practicing nurses today and will account for nearly half of the workforce by 2035 (Auerbach et al., 2024). This is welcome news for our workforce; however, the research revealed a shift away from nurses practicing in hospitals to ambulatory and community settings.
It should come as no surprise to anyone that nurses are leaving the bedside in acute care. Since the pandemic, we’ve known the main issues in acute care are providing adequate numbers of qualified and competent nurse at the bedside, recruitment, retention, and supporting the emotional health and well-being of staff (AONL, 2023). Nurses move to ambulatory care and community settings looking for flexibility in their schedules, the ability to develop better relationships with their patients, and in some cases, working remotely in telehealth.
It’s time to adopt initiatives that keep nurses at the bedside.
How can we ensure adequate staffing of competent nurses in acute care? Healthcare systems must listen to nurses and look at strategies to meet their needs.
- Adopt flexible staffing and scheduling that includes nurse competency and patient severity of illness/acuity. During the pandemic, acute care hospitals were very flexible but have regressed post-pandemic. Nurses today want flexibility in their schedules and hours to achieve work/life balance. While 12-hour shifts work for some, they don’t work for everyone. Healthcare systems need to adopt technology to assist them with scheduling and staffing. Nurse managers want scheduling and staffing to incorporate nurse competency and patient acuity into the equation. Patients are sicker than ever before. It’s imperative the hospital is staffed with the right nurse for the right patient; nurse competency and patient acuity matter when it comes to improving patient outcomes.
- Invest in nurse career support, recruitment, and retention. It’s not enough to bring nurses in the door; you need to retain them once they arrive. Institute career opportunity support so nurses feel that they have room to grow into more fulfilling positions, whether it’s laterally or up the career ladder. Nurse turnover and burnout decline if staffing is adequate, and the nurses feel supported in a safe work environment. Providing clinical decision support tools and life-long learning resources demonstrates an investment in nursing clinical practice.
- Offer flexible roles to keep more experienced nurses involved in patient care. Virtual nursing was originally used for patient follow-up post discharge or for telehealth. The pandemic and the nursing shortage changed how we utilize virtual nursing. Virtual nursing is now being used as a support for new graduate nurses and those with less experience. Having access to an experienced nurse with a click of a button can be a game-changer for keeping less experienced nurses by showing they are worth the investment. The virtual nurse has access to the patient’s electronic healthcare record and real time data to support clinical decision making.
- Be a beacon for nurse well-being and emotional health. Nurses, especially new nurses, are often traumatized by patient emergencies. Offering mental health support, conducting incident debriefs, and instituting a zero-tolerance policy for violence and lateral bullying is crucial. No nurse should have to worry about being physically or emotionally assaulted by staff, patients, or visitors.
It’s time to rewrite our narrative…Being a bedside nurse is the most challenging and most rewarding job in nursing.
Too often we hear, “I’m just a nurse.” I’ve watched bedside nurses throughout my career and without a doubt, it’s the most challenging job in our profession. Bedside nurses need to be generalists; they need to know a large amount of knowledge and they need to apply that knowledge in every situation. If they don’t know the answer, they need to know where to go for the best, evidence-based answers. Nurses are patient advocates, patient educators, expert negotiators, and care coordinators. They are the alarm system when a patient’s getting into trouble, and they don’t rest until the patients’ needs have been met.
Nurses, let’s be happy our numbers are starting to increase but, let’s not be complacent about what we need to do to retain a healthy, experienced, happy workforce.
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