NURS3000 – Issues and Trends in Nursing

NURS3000 – Issues and Trends in Nursing

NURS3000 – Issues and Trends in Nursing

July 10, 2010, 6052 Assignment Part 3

Educating New Nurses: A Paradox in the Nursing Shortage

The nursing shortage is a national concern. Newspapers or lay publications frequently provide the public with information on this topic. The importance of information presented to the public should be within the context of current nursing workforce trends. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to discuss information from a popular source on the topic of the availability of nursing education as it relates to what is happening in nursing and health care today and in the future.

Summary of an Article for NURS3000 – Issues and Trends in Nursing

The article chosen for this assignment was published on March 3, 2010, in the Press-Republican newspaper in Plattsburgh, New York (Bartlett, 2010). The author, Bartlett (2010), addressed the paradox between the restricted number of students accepted into nursing school and the shortage of nurses since 1998. Bartlett reported that there were 960 applicants to the Plattsburgh nursing program and that, because of clinical placements and faculty constraints, the 4-year nursing program allowed only 55 students. The community college was also overwhelmed with applicants; there were 430 applications for 70 available openings (Bartlett, 2010). This could be a national problem; the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (as cited in Bartlett, 2010) reported that, in 2008, 50,000 qualified applicants could not seek admission to schools of nursing because of inadequate numbers of faculty and not enough sites for clinical placement.

Relationship to Nursing Workforce Trends

The public perception of the nursing shortage parallels professional concerns found in the literature. Huston (2010) addressed the same issues regarding the nursing shortage and the paradox of educating future nurses. By 2016, there will be 587,000 new nursing positions available in the United States, “making nursing the nation’s top profession in terms of job growth” (Huston, 2010, p. 72). Job growth demands continue to increase because many students who have applied to nursing schools do not gain admission, despite the increased enrollment capacity of 5% to 16.6% each year for the past 10 years (Kuehn, 2007).

Kuehn (2007) attributed this limitation in the enrollment of nursing schools to the lack of faculty. In 2006, to enroll all students applying to the 329 nursing schools Kuehn surveyed, 637 faculty vacancies would have to be filled and 55 additional positions created. Also, because of the anticipated number of nursing faculty planning to retire, the shortage of faculty will only become worse. In a subsequent article, Kuehn (2008) reported that, in 2007, the partnership between the American Association of Retired Persons and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation created the Center to Champion Nursing in America. The goal of this center was to form multidisciplinary nursing workforce groups from 18 states who will exchange information and create plans to increase nursing school capacity (Kuehn, 2008).

Summary

If current conditions prevail, the nursing shortage in the United States will increase. The problem of educating sufficient numbers of nurses continues because of a lack of faculty and clinical placement sites, as in Bartlett’s (2010) state of New York. Aging nurses ready to retire add to this dilemma. The Center to Champion Nursing in America created multidisciplinary task forces in 18 states to address the problem of limited enrollment. Clearly the fluctuations in nursing shortages cause concern to both the public and nursing leadership (Laureate Education, Inc., 2009).

References for NURS3000 – Issues and Trends in Nursing

Bartlett, S. (2010, March 3). Schools helpless against nursing shortage. Press-Republican. Retrieved from http://pressrepublican.com/0100_news/x1726192928.com

Huston, C. J. (2010). Professional issues in nursing: Challenges and opportunities. Philadelphia, PA: Wolters Kluwer/Lippincott Williams and Wilkins.

Kuehn, B. M. (2007). No end in sight to nursing shortage: Bottleneck at nursing schools a key factor. The Journal of the American Medical Association, 298, 1623-1625. doi:10.1001/jama.298.14.1623

Kuehn, B. M. (2008). Groups target nursing school bottleneck to address medical workforce deficit. JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association, 300, 887-888. doi:10.1001/jama.300.8.887

Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2009). Workforce issues: The crisis in nursing [DVD]. In Issues and trends in nursing. Baltimore, MD: Author.

Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2010). Name of program [Video webcast]. Retrieved from http://www.courseurl.com