Forward Progress: Solving the Nursing Shortage
The nursing shortage is having an effect. Below are just the recent moments of solution finding.
College of Notre Dame of Maryland School of Nursing will be launching a new 4-year BSN program in Fall 2011 to help with Maryland’s nursing shortage.
West Virginia Wesleyan College is installing a new simulation lab, complete with two $50,000 mannequins for their nursing program. Students can practice dealing with emergency situations with the high-tech mannequin patients. Instructors will observe the scenarios through a two-way mirror (less distracting for the students in theory, but I can tell you I would know I had an audience and it would distract the hell out of me).
Michigan State University’s College of Nursing just received a five-year, $1.4M grant; the money will be put toward expanding their primary care nurse practitioner program. Twenty-six other schools received the same grant for their nursing programs.
The University of Nebraska Medical Center’s College of Nursing has a new $14M Center for Nursing Science. The Center’s larger capacity and increased faculty will help to implement UNMC’s plan to help alleviate the nursing shortage.
Funding where it’s needed, new learning labs, expanded programs: all to the good. On the off-chance no one was paying attention, nurses are necessary.
Further Reading:
Global Nursing Shortage
High Licensing Exam Pass Rates for NMSU Nursing School Grads
New Nursing Degree Program
Top Ten Recession-Proof Jobs
RN Fast Track for Vocational Nurses
Posted by Alexa Harrington
I have been following your excellent node blots on this arc and find myself with a question. I may have missed this being discussed, given my Old Retired Flatulence lack of attention span, but what is the critical factor in the shortage of nurses? Is it a lack of the young wanting to study the discipline? Is it a lack of education/training facilities? Or is it an outflow of the graduate practitioners from the discipline? Or some factor that has escaped me?