Nursing Staff Retention Paper

According to my literature review, the workplace of many hospitals can be physical and emotionally demanding due to cutting staff and other resources to meet the budget (Mensik & Nickitas, 2015). Disparities in nurse satisfaction can impact turnover and generally the hospital profitability. Nurses who are satisfied are more likely to remain with their current employer which would reduce the costs of training and hiring new nurses (Everhart, Neff, Al-Amin, Nogle, & Weech-Maldonado, 2013). When it comes to the budget, looking at the overall picture regarding staffing is needed. Recruitment is needed and is an integral part of staffing. Hospitals have a large budget to recruit, whether those funds are used for marketing at various nursing schools, internship programs, scholarship programs, sign on bonuses, or even offering a bonus to staff for bringing in new employees, the amount of money spent can be

This study uses nurse staffing variables, patient outcome variables, and background variables. The nurse staffing variables will involve the number of nurses to skill mix and patient volume. Patient outcome variables will be categorized into infection control, patient safety, subjective and objective outcomes, and complications. The background variables are important to accurate correlation and may relate to both patient outcome and nurse staffing and will include organizational systems, nurse characteristics, patient characteristics, and organizational characteristics.

In the globalized and changed competitive business world, it is important responsibility to deal with employee turnover for any organization. Effective and efficient management of employee turnover is an essential task to achieve the organizational overhead goals. Significant amount of research has been undertaken to understand the major causes of employee's turnover and retentions mechanisms that organizations should develop, especially in the field of healthcare.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (USBLS) estimates the need for 439,300 registered nurses (RN) from 2014 to 2024, equating to a 16% increase in employment opportunities (USBLS, 2015). Approximately 30% of new RNs leave their first jobs with less than a year of hire and 525,000 nurses are expected to retire from 2012 to 2022- a demand totaled to around 1 million jobs by 2022. This increase is attributed to retiring baby boomers, turnovers, healthcare reform, and the increasing aging population (Kiel, 2012; USBLS, 2013). Control over the retirement of baby boomers is unrealistic, however, nursing turnover can be regulated.

I agree that an organization’s structure plays an influential role in a nurse’s overall satisfaction. In fact, Buffington, Zwink, and Fink (2012) concur stating, “Creating an organizational culture committed to registered nurse (RN) retention is a strategy to reduce nurse turnover” (p. 273). Research reveals numerous hospitals today are restructuring their organizations to try and increase overall nurse satisfaction and retention. This “new recipe for healthcare leadership and organization is needed,” according to Miners, Hundert, and Lash (2015), not only to improve nurse satisfaction, but ultimately to improve quality of care and increase patient outcomes (p. 114).

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (USBLS) (2015) estimates an additional of 439,300 more registered nurses (RNs) for 2014 to 2024, equating to a 16% increase in employment. Approximately 30% of new RNs leave their first jobs less than a year upon hiring, while 525,000 nurses are expected to retire until 2022- a demand totaled to around 1 million jobs by 2022. The increase is attributed to retiring baby boomers, turnovers, healthcare reform, and the increasing aging population (Kiel, 2012; USBLS, 2013). Control over baby boomer retirements are unrealistic, however, nursing turnover can be regulated to aid the growing needs of the society.

Nurses play important role in the financial performance of their organizations since they have direct patient contact. The financial cost attributed to an organization for losing a single nurse is estimated to be equivalent to twice the annual salary of the nurse. To put it in monetary terms, the average hospital is estimated to lose about $300,000 per year for each percentage increase in annual nurse turnover (Hunt, 2009). Losing these nurses not only affects the finances of the healthcare organizations, but also the excellence of care provided to patients’. Nursing turnover decreases the patient care quality by increasing the length of stay at hospitals and increased incidence of illnesses acquired at hospitals. In situations like these, some healthcare organizations have reported having to turn away patient to other healthcare facilities due to lack of available staff (Hunt, 2009).

Where Has All The Staff Gone? Strategies to Recruit and Retain Quality Staff by Helen M. Hauff explores the dangerous shortage of nurses in healthcare. The shortage of nurses today has challenged and tested many human resources departments, forcing many directors to “think outside of the box” and look at different strategies for recruitment and retention. According to Hauff, the average recruitment costs per nurse can exceed $100,000 and the supply of nurses needs to increase by 9% a year just to keep up with demand (Hauff, 2007). Many health care systems and specialty clinics have tried to lure registered nurses and nurse practitioners with higher salaries and better benefits. The competition for quality staff has come with a price, staff turnover results in extra costs for recruiting and retraining employees. Hauff, a certified transplant nurse naturally focuses on the staff shortages in her specialty. The shortage of certified transplant nurses is critical, and according to Hauff many health care systems are closing down transplant units due to staff shortages and rising costs. Although Hauff tends to focus on solving the problems with transplant specialists, the same recommendations she outlines can be applied to any health care specialty.

Staffing; healthcare organizations struggle to attract and retain workers. (2005) Science Letter, 1537. Retrieved from

Hospitals and other healthcare facilities invest time and money when searching for qualified nursing personnel. This time-consuming and costly process involves position advertisement, candidate search, interview and hiring procedures, and training. The investment of hiring a new nurse exceeds that of maintaining current nurses employed. Nurse retention correlates to continued hands-on practice and improvement of clinical techniques; thus, benefiting patient care. Cabral et al. (2016) note that although finances and staffing may decrease in the future healthcare environment, providing compassionate stability and support to nurses, as it is given to patients, creates a culture of caring and fosters retention. Hopefully, effective training of

The never ending nurse shortage looms constantly as a reminder in the healthcare setting that with the increase of human population, superior medical technology, major changes to the nation’s medical healthcare, that this nursing shortage is predicted to worsen. The past four years have seen a steady rise in hospital turnover rates. More than 40% of the currently working registered nurses (RNs) will begin to approach retirement age in the next 10 years. (Pellico, 2009) This in addition to the turnover rate will compound matters. Hospitals

In addition this study is expected to link the gap on the determinants of employee retention in the organization. The researcher is convinced that there is more than one solution available to promote employee retention as there is definitely not only one factor that is causing nurses to leave their organization. Finally the researcher believes that this research study would give an opportunity for the organization to grow and at the same time it gives new life for the

hospitals of RN turnover and intention to quit have ranged from 17% to 36% (6,7), figures that compare to an overall turnover rate of 2.2% for those employed in health services and social services and 1.2% for those employed in educational services” (Stone, Clarke, Cimiotti, and Correa-de-Araujo, pg. 1). Personally, I can see the trend in high turnover rates in the area that I am currently working. I work on the Pediatric Hematology Oncology Unit, and the turnover rate for nurses in that unit is roughly around 27% yearly. The new Nurse Manager just had a meeting with all floor nurses, and spoke on how high those rates were, and that he is looking forward to hiring nurses that will stay, and find the goodness in our specific job. The working environment for nurses is so strenuous. After people attend nursing school, they realize that they no longer want to work in the area they originally thought they did because it is too stressful, both physically and emotionally. Data reveals that “the incidence rate of injuries and illnesses per 100 fulltime workers employed in nursing and personal care facilities is 13.5” (Stone, Clarke, Cimiotti, and Correa-de-Araujo, pg.

Rondeau et al. (2008) reported that lack of awareness pertaining to the significant changes of employee market factors in nursing turnover and vacancy. Effective and efficient nurses retention strategies are some of the ways to handle with turnover in healthcare organizations, not all reasons for turnover are employer

The employee turnover in health care industry is very high. In fact in some of the US states, it is double the national average of 15.6%. The statistics related to employee turnover rate are highly alarming and are growing even worse day by day. While on the one hands it would appear that the chief reason behind this phenomenon is the relatively short supply of talented individuals or workers(Jones, 2000). But over time research has identified another important factor behind this phenomenon which is the mismanagement of human resources in health care sector. Limited talent supply coupled with poor human resource management have led to compounding the problem. Due to poor health care workforce management the turnover rate in this sector has remained high. An aging talent pool which is not being replaced at the rate it is depleting has compounded the problems being faced by the health care industry.