On April 27th, we asked Nurses to respond to an op-ed in the LA Times which stated that the nursing shortage is due to a lack of compassion in society. Read the story here
Here are what Nurses had to say….
Our College is super expensive, flat wages out paced by inflation, and a management culture based on ever expanding profits off the backs of Nurses and others expected to shoulder unrealistic dangerous patient loads that drives anyone with intelligence and choices out of nursing or up to the Practitioner Level.
D.C.
I’m discouraged by long days, 12-hr shifts and EMR – more and more paperwork to track the paperwork to see if I’m doing an efficient job of accepting patients and then documenting said patient with tons of paperwork and then administration wants to know why our charting is not up to par?!?!? No time to spend with the PATIENT – since there is so much paperwork to back up the paperwork that says I spent enough time with the patient. Can’t speak my mind on social media either …
J.T.
The paperwork is more important to management; yet you are expected to give excellent patient care. Management doesn’t want patient complaints. Can’t have it both ways due to time constraint. In the end, patient care suffers. And nurse sanity suffers. Other careers look preferable to the new nurse…..much lower levels of stress, not life and death situations, better work hours and conditions, etc. Nursing shortage is due to abusive work conditions for the nursing staff.
M.K.