Education and employers are key to solving nursing shortage

As the COVID-19 pandemic transitions into a new, less acute phase, nursing stands at a crossroads.

Maine, like the rest of the nation, is in the grips of a significant nursing shortage that has grown worse since the pandemic.

While in some ways Maine and MaineHealth’s nursing workforce are making progress in addressing the nursing shortage, more is needed. The key to right-sizing the supply of nurses for our hospitals, clinics, nursing homes, schools, and other health care settings lies in the continued increase in the production of nurse graduates and successful efforts by employers to ensure the profession remains viable.

State of the nursing workforce

In 2021, Maine had an estimated shortage of 2,250 RNs, according to a report published by the Maine Nursing Action Coalition and the Maine Hospital Association. The report indicates the shortage could grow to as much as 3,200 RNs by 2025. While this data isn’t surprising to employers (MaineHealth, the state’s largest health system, has more than 600 open RN positions currently covered by nurse travelers), it is consistent with the well-established national nursing shortage.

With only about 2 percent of Maine nurses unemployed, where will the state find nurses to address current and future openings? The good news is Maine nursing schools and employers are already working on this with some promising results.

Maine Medical Center President Jeff Sanders gives the keynote address at the December 16, 2022 School of Nursing Convocation at the University of Southern Maine. Courtesy University of Southern Maine

Between 2015 and 2021, the number of licensed nurses in Maine grew from 27,000 to nearly 28,000 (only about 85 percent of licensed nurses work in nursing and half of them work in hospitals). Additionally, Maine nurses are getting younger. The driver behind these positive trends is the state’s increase in nursing graduates. With larger nursing cohorts and employers eager to hire them, Maine is demonstrating that it can address the shortage locally.

Quality Care and Nurse Retention

A recent Harvard Business Review article analyzed why health care workers are remaining in the field when many have left. A primary reason they stay is that their employers share their same commitment to providing quality care. This is where Maine has a competitive advantage.

In 2021, the Leapfrog Group, the nation’s leading independent patient safety advocate, named Maine the top state of the decade for patient safety. Maintaining and supporting our state’s culture of quality care – and engaging nurses in it – will be critical to maintaining our health care workforce.

More Support for Nurses

The time has come to acknowledge that nursing is more than just an intrinsically rewarding field. It is also incredibly demanding. To be sustainable, we need to invest in nurses and all care team members.

Since the start of the pandemic, MaineHealth has increased wages for all non-executive and non-physician care team members by $250 million. In addition, in 2022 MaineHealth began providing free online counseling to all care team members.

If Maine hopes to have not only an appropriate-sized nursing workforce but an extraordinary one like it has today, we need to invest more in nurses.