Trained support staff lags in many areas

While turnover and vacancy rates for nurses are slowly reaching all-time highs, health care officials will also have to address the growing shortage of trained support staff for doctors in others areas as well.

Current workforce shortages are projected to steadily worsen until 2012; registered nursing jobs alone are projected to increase by 15 percent over the next six years, and radiological technology jobs are projected to increase by 26 percent during this same time, reports the Oklahoma Health Care Workforce Center.

“Because of our location, it’s very difficult to find somebody that has that clinical experience already, and the didactic, the book knowledge through school,” said Christy Morris, director of the OR at Day Surgery. “It’s a constant battle to find qualified people to come in for surgery.”

The Oklahoma Hospital Association reported in 2005 that scrub technicians had a 17.2 percent turnover rate in the state. And there was a 6.6 percent vacancy rate for scrub techs in the state. According to the same report, licensed practicing nurses had the highest turnover rate of 22.9 percent and occupational therapist had the highest vacancy rate at 18.9 percent.

Morris said she understand from first-hand experience how tough it is to balance a family and a full-time job, while attending school. She had to put her own dreams of obtaining Master’s of Science degree in Nursing degree on hold for the past two years, she said. But her own experience has caused Morris to take matters into her own hands and start finding solutions for her staff, she said.

“Unless you really need people, you don’t think about it as much,” Morris said. “It concerns me about filling their spots adequately. It’s hard to find the position of a scrub tech. We’ve kind of taken on the responsibility of it. If there is some one that’s interested in learning how to scrub. We train them ourselves.”

While the Southern Oklahoma Technology center offers a bio-tech program it was wonderful to make an extra $3 per hour and avoid the hassle of 13 hours of class-time, $3,000 in tuition and taking time off from work, said Sherrie Williams, surgical technician at Day Surgery.

“Well they just trained me up with another nurse that was another scrub tech,” said Williams, who previously worked as a medical assistant. “Actually I didn’t know anything as far as going into the OR. I didn’t know anything. Any instruments or anything. I was just basically here and trained at the facility.”

Williams said she started her training at Day Surgical in May 2007 and was finished within five weeks. “I’ve been in the medical profession for 15 plus years. I just really wanted to get my hands in more than what I was doing. I was a first, as far as someone that’s not been in that role before to be trained and to go back and be able to do that work.”

Day Surgery has a staff of about 25, including registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, scrub technicians, medical assistants and transcribers.

And training in some of these and other health care professions are offered at Murray State College, said Joni Jeter, nursing program director at MSC.

Jeter said the nursing school started an online program to accept 20 additional students per semester, since the college has the interested candidates who want to get into nursing. But the school doesn’t have the space or the funds to teach them. The nursing school accepts 60 classroom students but has to reject about 60 applicants because of seat limitations, she said.

“We can’t accept students in the traditional classrooms because we don’t have room. Online students don’t take up room, they don’t take up seat space, and it’s much easier to get clinical spaces at hospitals on Fridays and Saturday,” Jeter said.

Nationally, RN’s on average are retiring from bedside work between the ages of 53 and 56.

Recognizing that the average age of students entering Oklahoma’s nursing programs is between 27 and 32 years old, it is projected that Oklahoma will lose a combined 20 to 25 years of productivity in the nursing workforce alone, according to the Oklahoma Health Care Workforce Resource Center. Consequently, unless Oklahoma actively recruits a sufficient number of high school students into health care careers such as nursing, and successfully increases the average retirement age of nurses already in the profession, the long-term effects of work force shortages will remain a serious challenge to the health care industry, according to the same report.

“In 10 or 15 years we’re all going to be retiring, and we’re not producing enough nurses right now,” she said. “I don’t know how old you are, but I’m going to be lucky if I have a nurse when I retire.”

Keith Howard, 221-6542
keith.howard@ardmoreite.com