News, advice, and insights for nurses and the people who hire them.
In Dayton, Ohio, the nursing shortage has evaporated — at least for the time being. One hospital in Dayton recently has been telling nurses to stay home rather than come in for scheduled shifts. Some of the nurses at this hospital lost up to a third of their regularly scheduled hours during the holi...
Read more →This article in Health Leaders Media has an interesting perspective from hospitals regarding controlling nurse labor costs. It lays out a three-pronged approach to reduce personnel costs for nurses; a new approach to nurse overtime, use of supplemental labor such as from nursing agencies or from an...
Read more →Electronic Health Records are somewhat controversial — some people think they’re a great idea, some people really don’t. Evidence is starting to come in regarding whether they make a difference, and the news seems to be pretty good. Nurse.com has an article explaining a new study out of the Universi...
Read more →A new regulation went into effect January 1st, 2012, setting industry-wide standards for electronic funds transfers in healthcare, as required by the Affordable Care Act. It will reduce up to $4.5 billion over the next 10 years in administrative costs, according to estimates published yesterday by t...
Read more →“The New Old Age,” a New York Times blog discusses a study that shows that staffers at non-profit nursing homes are happier than their counterparts at for-profit nursing homes. This is in keeping with many other studies that have shown that nonprofits do a better job of caring for patients. It makes...
Read more →When researchers took a look at the number of new students entering nursing school, they were pleasantly surprised to learn that the nursing shortage may not be as bad as they once predicted it would be when the baby boomer nurses begin to retire or leave the profession. Dr. David I. Auerbach conduc...
Read more →The California strike that was discussed here did in fact happen yesterday. Today, the nurses who participated in the strike were locked out by hospitals, in a continuing dispute over health care costs, sick leave, and staffing levels. Official numbers on how many nurses went on strike on Thursday d...
Read more →A study has found that nurses tend to find work that is close to the nursing school that they graduated from. This means that areas without nursing schools — such as rural areas — tend to have a harder time finding nurses. And if there aren’t enough nurses to go around, that has serious implications...
Read more →A study published in June of 2000 in the Journal of the American Medical Association painted a pretty bleak picture of the future of nursing. Of particular concern was whether there would be enough nurses to go around by the year 2020. They projected that there would be 20% fewer nurses than would a...
Read more →Many hospitals are moving towards a policy of “walk the talk” when it comes to the health of their employees. Some will no longer hire smokers, and prospective employees can expect to be tested for tobacco products at the first interview with a mouth swab. Hospitals want their employees to set an ex...
Read more →Nebraska is concerned about the nursing shortage, and especially the fact that is likely to worsen over the next decade. Juliann Sebastian, dean of the University of Nebraska Medical Center College of Nursing, says that this shortage is different because of the large number of aging Nebraskans, and...
Read more →A survey has found that one way to improve patient care is to improve the work environment for nurses. Staffing levels are also important, but this survey indicated that even just a single incremental increase in how nurses rated their physical work environment resulted in a nearly five times greate...
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