Posted on 07/27/2009 6:14:59 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
For more than a decade, the U.S. has faced a shortage of nurses to staff hospitals and nursing homes. While the current recession has encouraged some who had left the profession to return, about 100,000 positions remain unfilled. Experts say that if more is not done to entice people to enter the fieldand to expand the U.S.'s nurse-training capacitythat number could triple or quadruple by 2025. President Barack Obama's goal of expanding health coverage to millions of the uninsured could also face additional hurdles if the supply of nurses can't meet the demand.
Some lawmakers are looking to the immigration pipeline as one means to raise staffing levels. In May, Representative Robert Wexler (D-Fla.) introduced a bill that would allow 20,000 additional nurses to enter the U.S. each year for the next three years as a temporary measure to fill the gap. If the bill doesn't pass on its own, lawmakers may include it in a comprehensive immigration reform package. Obama is slated to meet with congressional leaders on June 25 to discuss reforming U.S. immigration laws.
Hospital administrators such as William R. Moore in El Centro, Calif., a sparsely populated town 100 miles east of San Diego, see the Wexler bill as a potential life raft. Moore is chief human resources director at El Centro Regional Medical Center, a 135-bed public hospital that typically has 30 open positions for registered nurses (RNs). While it's hard to lure nurses from nearby big cities (San Diego is 100 miles west), Moore says he could quickly recruit dozens of eager, qualified nurses from the Philippines if the government allocated more visas. "All we want is temporary relief," says Moore. "Let us get a group of experienced RN hires from the Philippines, and we won't ask for more."
(Excerpt) Read more at businessweek.com ...
I see the H1B solution is spreading to other professions. Instead of offering a higher wage to entice more people to enter the field of nursing, the health racket now just wants to undercut wages and benefits by bringing in foreign workers who will do the job for less.
Maybe 70, 60 or 50 ?
I guess all the nurses to replace all those tonsillectomy performing pediatricians & other docs isn’t going to pan out for Obama and the democrats.
These idiots in Washington need a dose of their own medicine.
I happen to know many of these nurses, and while they are good people, hardworking, they are NOT up to snuff to be RNs at US standards.
They usually require additional training, plus there are still some language barriers.
And do I really believe that they "won't ask for more"?
H1B’s have decimated the IT and Engineering profession so why not do the same for Healthcare? Of course accidentally killing someone might have greater consequences than writing poor code. We are destroying the middle class from top to bottom.
Actually at the Medical University of SC some nurse anesthetists make over $210K per year)
Rationed healthcare will solve this problem, because the average life expectancy will drop down to about 50 years old.
No, the hospitals are looking for “cheap” help. There are plenty of US nurses, but the hospitals want to pay third-world pay rates.
Good. My wife is going into nursing. Nice to know that there is a bottomless pit of demand for that line of work...
In the defense of hospitals, if we removed the bag limits on lawyers to reduce the malpractice load, the medical cost crisis would vanish!
“Obama is slated to meet with congressional leaders on June 25 to discuss reforming U.S. immigration laws.”
Did this meeting get reported on? What was discussed? Inquiring minds want to know what BO has decided “immigration reform” will look like. All his other “reforms” mean more big government taking away our freedom.
Shall we job out "reporting and editing" to people from India who will work for $6,000 a year? I'll bet we'd have "journalist shortages" too if the wages were dropped by importing foreign workers.
Raise the pay and they'll be nurses, and nurses and nurses - everywhere.
Students lining up for nursing spots but program openings limited
http://www.lansingstatejournal.com/article/20090726/NEWS01/907260547/1001/NEWS
Why would anyone go to the expense and effort of becoming a nurse if their efforts are going to be undercut by imports?
www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/200905 - [Cached Version]
Published on: 5/20/2009
A-B Tech nursing department said this year some graduating nurses didn’t even get interviews at hospitals where they had applied, and some hospitals that may have hired nurses before they were licensed aren’t doing that this year.
Some graduates of A-B Tech said they had applied to area hospitals and had not heard back. Those who were granted interviews were told they were up against dozens of other candidates and didn’t receive offers.
The situation is in sharp contrast to past years.
“Usually, anyone who wanted a job had a position offered to them” . “We’re not seeing that this year.”
Unable to find full-time employment, some graduates from A-B Tech have taken part-time positions or gone back to jobs they held before they received their nursing degree, while others are looking into taking jobs that may not have been their first choice.
This is from an article in our local paper. Our local hospitals are not hiring many new nurses. Some nursing homes have a hiring freeze. Theres’s no nursing shortage here, it’s a job shortage.
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