Skip to main content
Sister Publication Links
  • ESG: THE NEW IMPERATIVE
Subscribe
  • My Account
  • Login
  • Subscribe
  • News
    • Current News
    • COVID-19
    • Providers
    • Insurance
    • Government
    • Finance
    • Technology
    • Safety & Quality
    • Transformation
    • People
    • Regional News
    • Digital Edition (Web Version)
    • Patients
    • Operations
    • Care Delivery
    • Payment
    • Midwest
    • Northeast
    • South
    • West
  • Digital Health
  • Insights
    • ACA 10 Years After
    • Best Practices
    • Special Reports
    • Innovations
  • Data/Lists
    • Rankings/Lists
    • Interactive Databases
    • Data Points
  • Op-Ed
    • Bold Moves
    • Breaking Bias
    • Commentaries
    • Letters
    • Vital Signs Blog
    • From the Editor
  • Awards
    • Nominate/Eligibility
    • 100 Most Influential People
    • 50 Most Influential Clinical Executives
    • Best Places to Work in Healthcare
    • Excellence in Governance
    • Health Care Hall of Fame
    • Healthcare Marketing Impact Awards
    • Top 25 Emerging Leaders
    • Top 25 Innovators
    • Diversity in Healthcare
    • Women in Healthcare
    • - Luminaries
    • - Top 25 Diversity Leaders
    • - Leaders to Watch
    • - Luminaries
    • - Top 25 Women Leaders
    • - Women to Watch
  • Events
    • Conferences
    • Galas
    • Virtual Briefings
    • Webinars
    • Transformation Summit
    • Women Leaders in Healthcare Conference
    • Social Determinants of Health Symposium
    • Leadership Symposium
    • Health Care Hall of Fame Gala
    • Top 25 Women Leaders Gala
    • Best Places to Work Awards Gala
    • Top 25 Diversity Leaders Gala
    • - Hospital of the Future
    • - Value Based Care
    • - Supply Chain Revenue Cycle
    • - Hospital at Home
    • - Workplace of the Future
    • - Strategic Marketing
    • - Virtual Health
  • Listen
    • Podcast - Next Up
    • Podcast - Beyond the Byline
    • Sponsored Podcast - Healthcare Insider
    • Video Series - The Check Up
    • Sponsored Video Series - One on One
  • MORE +
    • Advertise
    • Media Kit
    • Newsletters
    • Jobs
    • People on the Move
    • Reprints & Licensing
MENU
Breadcrumb
  1. Home
  2. Hospitals
December 02, 2020 04:29 PM

Nurses wanted: Swamped hospitals scramble for pandemic help

Associated Press
  • Tweet
  • Share
  • Share
  • Email
  • More
    Reprints Print

    U.S. hospitals slammed with COVID-19 patients are trying to lure nurses and doctors out of retirement, recruiting students and new graduates who have yet to earn their licenses and offering eye-popping salaries in a desperate bid to ease staffing shortages.

    With the virus surging from coast to coast, the number of patients in the hospital with the virus has more than doubled over the past month to a record high of nearly 100,000, pushing medical centers and health care workers to the breaking point.

    “Nurses are under immense pressure right now,” said Kendra McMillan, a senior policy adviser for the American Nurses Association. “We’ve heard from nurses on the front lines who say they’ve never experienced the level of burnout we’re seeing right now.”

    Governors in hard-hit states like Wisconsin and Nebraska are making it easier for retired nurses to come back, including by waiving licensing requirements and fees, though it can be a tough sell for older nurses, who would be in more danger than many of their colleagues if they contracted the virus.

    Some are taking jobs that don’t involve working directly with patients to free up front-line nurses, McMillan said.

    Iowa is allowing temporary, emergency licenses for new nurses who have met the state’s educational requirements but haven’t yet taken the state licensing exam. Some Minnesota hospitals are offering winter internships to nursing students to boost their staffs. The internships are typically offered in the summer but were canceled this year because of COVID-19.

    Methodist Hospital in Minneapolis will place 25 interns for one to two months to work with COVID-19 patients, though certain tasks will remain off-limits, such as inserting IVs or urinary catheters, said Tina Kvalheim, a nurse who runs the internship program.

    “They’ll be fully supported in their roles so that our patients receive the best possible, safe care," Kvalheim said..

    Landon Brown, 21, of Des Moines, Iowa, a senior nursing student at Minnesota State University, Mankato, recently accepted an internship at the Mayo Clinic in Mankato. He was assigned to the pediatric unit’s medical-surgical area but said he might come across patients with the coronavirus.

    Brown's resolve to help patients as a nurse was reaffirmed after his 90-year-old grandfather contracted the virus and died over the weekend.

    “The staff that he had were great, and they really took a lot of pressure off of my folks and my family,” he said. “I think that if I can be that for another family, that would be great.”

    The University of Iowa’s College of Nursing is also trying to get graduates into the workforce quickly. It worked to fast-track students’ transcripts to the Iowa Board of Nursing so they could get licensed sooner upon graduating, said Anita Nicholson, associate dean for undergraduate programs.

    Nicholson said the college also scheduled senior internships earlier than normal and created a program that allows students to gain experience by working at University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics in Iowa City under a nurse’s supervision. Those students aren’t caring for coronavirus patients, but their work frees up other nurses to treat those who are infected, Nicholson said.

    “The sooner we can get our graduates out and into the workforce, the better,” she said.

    Wausau, Wisconsin-based Aspirus Health Care is offering signing bonuses of up to $15,000 for nurses with a year of experience.

    Hospitals also are turning to contract nurses who often travel from other states. But it's expensive, because hospitals around the country are competing for the same pool of nurses, driving salaries as high as $6,200 per week, according to posts for travel nursing jobs.

    April Hansen, executive vice president at San Diego-based Aya Healthcare, said there are now 31,000 openings for travel nurses, more than double the number being sought when the pandemic surged in the spring.

    “It is crazy," Hansen said. “It doesn’t matter if you are rural or urban, if you are an Indian health facility or an academic medical center or anything in between. ... All facilities are experiencing increased demand right now.”

    Nurses who work in intensive care and on medical surgical floors are the most in demand. Employers also are willing to pay extra for nurses who can show up on short notice and work 48 or 60 hours per week, instead of the standard 36.

    Doctors are in demand, too.

    “I don’t even practice anymore, and I’ve gotten lots of emails asking me to travel across the country to work in ERs,” said Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association. “I know that’s happening to a lot of nurses as well.”

    The outbreak in the U.S. is blamed for more than 270,000 deaths and 13.8 million confirmed infections. New cases are running at over 160,000 a day on average, and deaths are up to more than 1,500 a day, a level seen back in May, during the crisis in the New York City area.

    States are seeing record-breaking surges in deaths, including Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky in the middle of the country. Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said the virus is “spreading like wildfire.”

    A COVID-19 vaccine is expected to become available in a few weeks, and health care workers are likely to be given priority for the first shots. That could make it easier for hospitals to recruit help.

    To make room for the sickest, hard-hit institutions are sending home some COVID-19 patients who otherwise would have been kept in the hospital. They are also canceling elective surgeries or sending non-COVID-19 adult patients to pediatric hospitals.

    A hospital system in Idaho is sending some COVID-19 patients home with iPads, supplemental oxygen, blood pressure cuffs and oxygen monitors so they can finish recovering in their own beds.

    The computer tablets enable nurses to check in with them, and the oxygen monitors automatically send back information that staffers watch to make sure the patients are OK. A St. Louis hospital system is doing something similar.

    Across the U.S., hospitals are converting cafeterias, waiting rooms, even a parking garage to patient treatment areas. Some states are opening field hospitals.

    But that does nothing to ease the staffing shortage, especially in rural areas where officials say many people aren't taking basic precautions against the virus.

    Dr. Eli Perencevich, an epidemiology and internal medicine professor at the University of Iowa, said health care workers are paying the price for other people's refusal to wear masks.

    “It’s sending everyone to war, really,” he said. “We’ve decided as a society that we’re going to take all the people in our health care system and pummel them because we have some insane idea about what freedom really is.”

    Letter
    to the
    Editor

    Send us a letter

    Have an opinion about this story? Click here to submit a Letter to the Editor, and we may publish it in print.

    Recommended for You
    corona-hospital-money-mask_i.png
    New U.S. hospitals face fiscal crisis over COVID relief money
    DATA dive - finance - market up and down
    Delayed care drives increase in hospital expenses
    Sponsored Content
    Modern Healthcare A.M. Newsletter: Sign up to receive a comprehensive weekday morning newsletter designed for busy healthcare executives who need the latest and most important healthcare news and analysis.
    Get Newsletters

    Sign up for enewsletters and alerts to receive breaking news and in-depth coverage of healthcare events and trends, as they happen, right to your inbox.

    Subscribe Today
    MH Magazine Cover

    MH magazine offers content that sheds light on healthcare leaders’ complex choices and touch points—from strategy, governance, leadership development and finance to operations, clinical care, and marketing.

    Subscribe
    Connect with Us
    • LinkedIn
    • Twitter
    • Facebook
    • RSS

    Our Mission

    Modern Healthcare empowers industry leaders to succeed by providing unbiased reporting of the news, insights, analysis and data.

    Contact Us

    (877) 812-1581

    Email us

     

    Resources
    • Contact Us
    • Advertise with Us
    • Ad Choices Ad Choices
    • Sitemap
    Editorial Dept
    • Submission Guidelines
    • Code of Ethics
    • Awards
    • About Us
    Legal
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Privacy Policy
    • Privacy Request
    Modern Healthcare
    Copyright © 1996-2022. Crain Communications, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
    • News
      • Current News
      • COVID-19
      • Providers
      • Insurance
      • Government
      • Finance
      • Technology
      • Safety & Quality
      • Transformation
        • Patients
        • Operations
        • Care Delivery
        • Payment
      • People
      • Regional News
        • Midwest
        • Northeast
        • South
        • West
      • Digital Edition (Web Version)
    • Digital Health
    • Insights
      • ACA 10 Years After
      • Best Practices
      • Special Reports
      • Innovations
    • Data/Lists
      • Rankings/Lists
      • Interactive Databases
      • Data Points
    • Op-Ed
      • Bold Moves
      • Breaking Bias
      • Commentaries
      • Letters
      • Vital Signs Blog
      • From the Editor
    • Awards
      • Nominate/Eligibility
      • 100 Most Influential People
      • 50 Most Influential Clinical Executives
      • Best Places to Work in Healthcare
      • Excellence in Governance
      • Health Care Hall of Fame
      • Healthcare Marketing Impact Awards
      • Top 25 Emerging Leaders
      • Top 25 Innovators
      • Diversity in Healthcare
        • - Luminaries
        • - Top 25 Diversity Leaders
        • - Leaders to Watch
      • Women in Healthcare
        • - Luminaries
        • - Top 25 Women Leaders
        • - Women to Watch
    • Events
      • Conferences
        • Transformation Summit
        • Women Leaders in Healthcare Conference
        • Social Determinants of Health Symposium
        • Leadership Symposium
      • Galas
        • Health Care Hall of Fame Gala
        • Top 25 Women Leaders Gala
        • Best Places to Work Awards Gala
        • Top 25 Diversity Leaders Gala
      • Virtual Briefings
        • - Hospital of the Future
        • - Value Based Care
        • - Supply Chain Revenue Cycle
        • - Hospital at Home
        • - Workplace of the Future
        • - Strategic Marketing
        • - Virtual Health
      • Webinars
    • Listen
      • Podcast - Next Up
      • Podcast - Beyond the Byline
      • Sponsored Podcast - Healthcare Insider
      • Video Series - The Check Up
      • Sponsored Video Series - One on One
    • MORE +
      • Advertise
      • Media Kit
      • Newsletters
      • Jobs
      • People on the Move
      • Reprints & Licensing