Addressing Health Care Staffing Needs (Download as a PDF)

The Issue

The health care system is experiencing a staffing crisis unlike other previous decades. A combination of an aging workforce and declining enrollments in nursing schools demands a comprehensive state and national strategy, involving public and private energies and resources.

Although shortages exist in many health care professions, including pharmacy, physical therapy, occupational therapy, radiology and other technologies, the most pervasive (and probably most long-lasting) problem is the exploding shortage of registered nurses needed to deliver quality care in our communities.

In Texas, officials project the state will need a total of 161,000 nurses to meet demand by 2010.

Shortages seem to be especially severe in areas such as critical care, trauma care, and labor and delivery. Geriatrics, traditionally one of the least popular nursing specialties, is also experiencing staffing shortages. As a result, nursing units are being closed, patients are diverted to other locations, surgeries and other medical procedures are being canceled, and nurses are being asked to work extra hours often in understaffed conditions. These conditions are contributing to an escalating spiral of shortages as nurses seek other employment.

To combat the problem in Texas, lawmakers set aside $528,000 in 2004-05 to train additional registered nurses or faculty members, and designated approximately $100,000 to train licensed vocational nurses. They added a registered nurse to the Statewide Health Coordinating Council, an organization focused on helping the state formulate health care policies and programs, and established a Nursing Resource Center with the State Department of Health to collect data on training and employment trends.

Lawmakers earmarked another $6 million for the Nursing Shortage Reduction Fund to help colleges and universities recruit and retain faculty members In 2006-07. Another $1.8 million was directed to financial aid for registered nursing students and $90,000 for students seeking to become licensed vocational nurses.

The CHRISTUS Health Position: Support full funding for nurse training, education and recruitment.

The public will be significantly impacted by the current and impending nurse shortages. CHRISTUS Health advocates for a strong commitment in Congress and from the states to increase funding for undergraduate and graduate nursing and allied health professional education.

CHRISTUS Health urges the Texas Legislature to continue to appropriate funds to the state’s nursing programs to be used to add and retain nursing faculty in Texas schools; to implement programs that allow educational institutions to attract and enroll more students into nursing programs; to improve the workplace for nursing; to recruit a more diverse student population, and; to provide assistance to students to enable them to complete nursing studies.

January 2007