Government plan falls short of needed nurses
United Nurses of Alberta says the announcement of additional nurse recruitment on December 20 falls short of what is needed to stem the growing shortage.
The investment in attracting back former nurses and in facilitating the entry of “internationally educated nurses” is a small step. However, UNA says the recent announcements are not enough.
“Paying the costs for former RNs who want to come back to the profession and credentialing internationally educated nurses is a good step,” says UNA President Heather Smith. “But it is only a short-term baby step.”
“It’s not really accurate to say the province only needs 1,400 more nurses,” says Heather Smith. “There are likely 1,400 job vacancies open in our health system right now, that’s just the immediate crisis.”
The union points out that over one-third of the province’s nurses are 50 years of age and over. The average age for nurses to retire is 55.
“If we have 10,000 nurses retiring over the next five years, we need to recruit everyone of the 1,300 new graduates each year, and even that will clearly not be enough,” Heather Smith says.
“Lack of government planning in the 1990s left us with a huge workforce deficit that is now having a severe impact on our health care system,” says Heather Smith. “We need a crisis plan to educate far more nurses more quickly here in the province.”
The government says we will graduate 2000 RNs by 2012 and is graduating about 1400 this year.
“They need to get 600 more students into nursing programs in 2008 if they are going to graduate 2000 nurses four years from now,” Heather Smith points out.
In 1990, Alberta’s nursing programs graduated 898 RNs but that number had dropped to 440 in 1999. All the in-hospital nursing programs were closed and the educational institution nursing programs were not expanded enough to make up the difference.
“The 1990s, with nursing layoffs and an exodus to the U.S. and other provinces, has left us with a whole generation missing from our nursing workforce. The government fought what it called a fiscal deficit but has left us with a workforce deficit,” Heather Smith says.
UNA has been working hard on the retention side of the equation – encouraging senior nurses to delay retiring.
“We need to encourage our senior nurses to stay in the workforce longer, partly to keep doing the work, and partly to mentor new nurses,” Heather Smith says.
UNA and the Health Regions have begun implementing several pilot projects that can encourage nurses to postpone retirement. These include allowing nurses to reduce their hours, but maintain full pension contributions, and a plan to allow nurses nearing retirement to spend less time at the “bedside” and more time in leadership and mentoring roles.
UNA is the union of 26,000 Registered Nurses and Registered Psychiatric Nurses in the province. The most recent Collective Agreement for most nurses, those working for the province’s Health Regions, was ratified in July of this year.
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