Posted on 01/09/2009 5:23:45 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
MILWAUKEE — Please, please accept a high-paying job with us. In fact, just swing by for an interview and we'll give you a chance to win cash and prizes.
Sounds too good to be true, especially in an economy riddled with job cuts in nearly every industry. But applicants for nursing jobs are still so scarce that recruiters have been forced to get increasingly inventive.
One Michigan company literally rolled out a red carpet at a recent hiring event. Residential Home Health, which provides in-home nursing for seniors on Medicare, lavished registered nurses and other health care workers with free champagne and a trivia contest hosted by game-show veteran Chuck Woolery. Prizes included a one-year lease for a 2009 SUV, hotel stays and dinners.
"We're committed to finding ways to creatively engage with passive job seekers," said David Curtis, president of the Madison Heights-based company.
Recruiters like Curtis may have little choice. The long-standing U.S. nurse shortage has led to chronic understaffing that can threaten patient care and nurses' job satisfaction, and the problem is expected to worsen.
The shortage has been operating since World War II on an eight- to 10-year cycle, industry experts say. Each time the number of nurses reaches a critical low, the government adds funding and hospitals upgrade working conditions. But as the deficit eases, those retention efforts fade and eventually the old conditions return, often driving nurses into other professions.
"We recently had a hiring event where, for experienced nurses to interview — just to interview — we gave them $50 gas cards," said Tom Zinda, the director of recruitment at Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare in the Milwaukee-area city of Glendale. "We really try to get as creative as we can.
(Excerpt) Read more at denverpost.com ...
I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night. :-)
Great job perhaps, but first you have to survive the brain damage of college. Liberal college professors can and will make your education a nightmare.
The problem with Nursing is the education system run by unionized educrats.
There are not enough spots in Nursing Schools. Getting one is time and resource-consuming. And often infuriating.
However, if you make it through, it is one of the most satisfying careers there is. Lucrative too, if you’re willing to put in the hours. Also relatively immune to economic conditions, as people get sick no matter what the economy is doing.
(ICU Nurse)
You obviously don’t know $hit about nursing.
Amen!
Another big problem I've seen is the expectation to work all types of oddball hours - night, weekends, holidays or whenever. 2 of my daughters friends have mothers that are nurses and I can tell you that their job schedule has virtually destroyed their family life.
Surely you jest, secret garden. Sheeez. What’s with the daggers? From my experience, Chickensoup is on the mark.
Bluebird RN
“........the expectation to work all types of oddball hours-nights.weekends holidays........”
The problem is hospitals have to operate 24/7/365.
The problem with nursing isn't how the hospital treats you, it's how the patients AND their families treat you. The arrogance and sense of entitlement they feel often manifests itself in demands that the hospital treat them like they're all staying in a 5-star hotel. The nasty disposition of the patients and their families towards the nursing staff will shock you once you start to witness enough of it and see how easily that patient changes from total asshole to kind, worshiper once the doctor comes by the room for a 2 minute visit.
After listening to all the stories of the crap my wife and her coworkers get to put up with, I'm frankly losing my ability to be empathetic towards sick people.
EXCEPTION: WWII participants. These people are the always polite and respectful with an extraodinary desire to do things for themselves. Which is why my wife has to always remind them that she is there to assist them, and to not do certain things on their own.
When I was in college one frat house used to have parties called “Wednesday night hoggers”. It was because nurse-candidates took a load of tests on Tuesday and wanted to unwind. Some were cute, most were hoggers. A lot didn’t graduate, many pregnancies as well, they were worse than the grads.
Wednesday night hoggers were like 2:00AM at the local bar, any warm body will satisfy.
the newer nurses all want to "go on" and become nurse practitioners or educators or some other......
nursing in hospitals is grueling, back breaking, emotionally draining and you must keep up with all the new computerization, new drugs, treatments etc.....
but its a hellava job with such amazing human stories.....its just unbelievable the experiences ....but you have to like people to appreciate it.....
The problem with going into medicine is that they won’t let you in. They think that the more doctors and nurses they have, the more healthcare costs.
Who is “They”?? I thot efficient nursing and physician staffing actually lowers costs.
My sister is just finishing up her nursing degree.
She’s about to bank.
“The problem with Nursing is the education system run by unionized educrats.
There are not enough spots in Nursing Schools. Getting one is time and resource-consuming. And often infuriating.”
<<<I agree that there are not enough spots in nursing schools, and getting in is tough.
As the government regulates the nursing schools, they regulate the number of seats available, so like many problems, look to various levels of government for part of the cause.
Many of the nursing instructors are not educrats but capitalists who can make more money in private industry than in nursing education, so schools have a hard time keeping teaching staff which also contributes to the number of slots available. This is what I was told by a nursing professor last spring who teaches at a state school with approx. 450 pre-nursing freshman, of which 43 may be chosen for nursing program their junior year.
“Become a nurse if you want to be a factory worker.”
Tell me, what would you recommend (especially for women) in terms of careers that guarantee a job upon graduation from either a 2 (RN) or 4(BSN)-year degree with a livable wage? How many factory worker jobs are out there in this recession paying $50,000+ to start.
How many factory workers can do 2 more years past BSN and become nursing practioner or physician assistant?
“they treat nurses well until the critical shortage is alleviated.”
When there’s a shortage, nurses are in high demand and are well treated; when there’s a glut, nurses are in low demand and are ill treated.
How is this different from any other profession, job, or career?
Sounds like the natural equilibrium between the supply of nurses and the demand for them that would normally exist in a free market for healthcare has been short-circuited, probably by the entity that excels in short-circuiting markets: government.
Since at least the 1960’s there has been a critical on going, unending Nursing Shortage.
My 52 Years of with the Nursing profession: My mom was Head Nurse Cedars in LA
Sister: RNBSN Cardiac Rehab North Ridge.
My Wife RNBSN Trauma Nurse ten years Desert Regional Hospital.
The problem isn’t just a shortage of spots, but that the educators feel it is their “duty” to decide what is “nursing material”. As a result, most nursing classes undergo 20-40% attrition, with some as high as 70%.
Schools are only normally graded on high many of their graduates pass the entrance exam to be a nurse. They aren’t graded on what percentage of accepted applicants actually pass. Besides, most programs “bank” on all the aspiring wanna-bes taking pre-reqs, not the actual program itself. So, who really cares how many students get failed out? They’re a dime a dozen and the waiting list is around the corner. That’s the attitude.
As far instructors go, liberal idiots. I had to answer the most inane questions in liberally contorted ways to pass. If not for the “2 rules of college”, I would have failed out.
I tell new grads to forget 80% of what they learned in school because school doesn’t teach you how to be a nurse; it’s just the hazing.
That said, I make a good salary and can work all the overtime I want. I’m no angel, though. I don’t try to be. Instead, I’m a highly trained, highly experienced beside monitor, technician and interventioner. I don’t get paid for what I do, but rather, on what I prevent.
Ziravan, CCRN.
Here’s one I ask every nurse;
Q: What’s the difference between a rectal and an oral thermometer?
A: Taste.
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