Item — HN Reader

Exactly. There are TONS of new grad nurses out there who can't get jobs. Some of them go to medical call centers or outpatient clinics because they can't get any actual clinical or hospital experience. I know about 25 people just like this in the Bay Area.

What hospitals want but can't hire is some nurse with 3 years ER experience, 4 years ICU experience, who teaches ACLS and is willing to work for 65k.

It's just like the "engineering shortage" ... if they increase salaries, they can get what they claim they need/can't get.

Otherwise, they just need to hire and train new grads, which they totally don't want to do.

1 comments

Same here. In my area, this is one of the top professions to go into. All of them complain about how hard it is to get in and the obstacles along the way. It's so difficult that the senior ones feel a lot of pride in their position. Seem to earn it, too.

So, the solution is to reduce or remove those obstacles where possible so people can get the jobs and experiences they need. I mean, 80-90% of most nurse activities I see are more about effort than arcane knowledge or skills. Could let new hires mostly do that while bringing them in for other stuff several times a day to gradually build up their experience. Hand more stuff like that off to them over time.

A bunch of institutions doing this with just a handful of people at a time should make a huge difference in the availability of qualified talents starting after a few years.