Legislation Introduced to Ease Nationwide Nursing Shortage
Office of Sen. Dick Durbin
Legislation
would offer incentives to train more healthcare workers as nurses U.S. Senator Dick Durbin [D-IL]
introduced legislation late last night to address our nation’s nursing
shortage. The Nurse Training and Retention Act of 2007 (S.2064) would help create a pipeline to nursing for incumbent
ancillary healthcare workers who wish to advance their careers and for current
nurses who wish to receive specialty training and advanced degrees to become
nurse faculty.
“Everyone depends on nurses for quality patient care, yet the healthcare system
in America
lacks an adequate supply of nurses,” said Durbin. “By 2020, the shortage
could exceed one million. We have the opportunity to stop this trend and
start equipping our hospitals with the nursing workforce needed to provide
exceptional care. Today’s legislation proposes a new, innovative program
to address this critical need and build on the untapped resource of the current
healthcare workforce.”
Today’s legislation would ensure an adequate supply of
nurses and promote high-quality patient care by awarding Department of Labor
grants to programs that offer opportunities for a career ladder for current
healthcare workers and nurses to receive specialty training and higher
education.
Patients will receive better quality of care when we invest
in training the next generation of nurses to fill the nursing shortage.
said Cathy Glasson, RN, President of Nurse Alliance of SEIU, “This legislation
puts incumbent healthcare workers on track to become nurses—and no one is
better prepared to become nurses than those already working in healthcare."
Durbin
noted that the need for nurses is growing, but our ability to train more nurses
is not keeping up. In Illinois,
the number of qualified applicants being denied admission to nursing schools is
growing. From 2002 through 2003, there were 502 qualified students
rejected from Illinois
nursing schools. Last year, there were 1,900 students turned away because
of lack of faculty and resources. And yet, in spite of the increasing
number of eligible nursing school applicants, Illinois could be facing a shortage of over
21,000 nurses by 2020 because of a lack of nursing faculty.
Additionally,
healthcare organizations see several advantages in training healthcare workers
to become nurses because they require less time in orientation than new workers
and represent a diverse population more representative of the patients being
served. Nurses who advance from other healthcare positions are generally
better prepared to meet the demands of the bedside, are more aware of the work
environment and ready to meet its unique challenges.
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