On this date in 1860, the first 15 students entered the training program with St. Thomas’s Hospital in London. It was Florence Nightingale’s grand experiment, which as we all know, was a great success in some respects and backfired badly in others. But whatever, it is a date indelibly etched into the archives of nursing history.
Just when you think that the media can’t get any dumber (apologies to those intelligent journalists who care about their work) and the so-called experts can’t get any more dense, along comes something that makes you doubt that there’s any hope left for the human race.
This appeared on the website of Cbs5.com which I assume is a local California channel.
Report: California Facing Nursing Shortage
(AP) SACRAMENTO California’s top budget analyst says the state’s nursing shortage will continue to expand unless something is done to attract more students to nursing schools.
A report by Legislative Analyst Elizabeth Hill says California is facing a shortfall of 12-thousand full-time registered nurses within seven years if colleges don’t increase enrollment and improve graduation rates.
The report is urging the Legislature to award nursing schools with completion bonuses if they improve those graduation rates.
Now isn’t that ground breaking news? And I love their conclusion–that mass producing nurses is the only way that the shortage will be averted. But then, isn’t this contradictory to other reports?
They say that they need to attract more students to nursing schools, while other reports say that nursing schools are turning away thousands of qualified students. Is your head spinning yet?
And FYI, just for the record, the only thing that is going to attract people to nursing schools is to make nursing a more desirable career. And oh yeah, not only do you need to churn them out, you’ve got to keep them working.