Retention Strategies for Nurse Retirees - Essay Example

 Retention Strategies for Nurse Retirees The United States has been facing a shortage of nurses and this is expected to increase as the older nurses retire. There has been change in both supply and demand for nurses. The need for experienced nurses is compounded as the baby boomers require more care. By 2010 about 40 percent of the nursing workforce will be over 50 years of age (RWJF, 2006). This calls for immediate retention of nurses due to retire soon. The experience and wisdom of the older, experienced nurses is invaluable. Some patients like those on ventilators can be cared only by veterans, or those with difficult families or with variety of diseases. A more experienced nurse is in a better position to handle the needs of such patients. A multidisciplinary hospital like ours can derive benefits from the experience of such nurses. They can be used as senior educators, mentors or shapers of a new generation of outstanding nurses (RWJF, 2006). Thus, to utilize the services of the older nurses, the hospital must consider retraining for these nurses apart from discouraging policies that allow for early exit from the profession. There should be no negative attitudes towards the aging workforce or their capabilities and lifelong learning should be encouraged. Mentoring is a concept that is used by all businesses and involves a mentor and a protégé engaged in a long-term relationship (NLN, 2006). Individuals who experience mentor-protégé relationship advance faster in their career and earn higher salaries at an early age. The new recruits at the hospital often feel a lack of support and recognition by colleagues but collaboration with others helps them to overcome this feeling of isolation. A personalized supportive relationship has positive outcomes for both the mentor and the mentee. The new faculty member learns community norms as well as the skills, strategies and practices of teaching. If the role of a mentor is assigned to those that are about to retire, they would benefit from a mentoring relationship as they enter new roles in an academic setting. Through their experience it would be easier for them to identify potential leaders in nursing and nursing education. They will be in a better position to cultivate relationship in the best of interest of all concerned which includes the hospital, the mentor and the nurse herself. The mentor gets an opportunity to share her/his wisdom, knowledge and experience. The mentor also derives satisfaction from mentoring/guiding others in attaining self-clarity while also developing his/her own skills. Hence mentoring used across the career continuum would help in retaining nurses beyond the retirement age. As the nurses retire, losing human knowledge can seriously affect organizational performance. The roles of mature nurses should be redesigned which would allow retention of knowledge while allowing them to function as a part of the rapid response team (RRT). RRT responds at the first instance of a patient’s worsening condition and before a serious medical emergency can develop (CARE, n.d.). To assess the patient’s condition and offer care beyond the unit nurse can only be possible by an experienced nurse. The hospital benefits as it exemplifies the hospital’s commitment to provide safe and immediate care. This would also have economic benefits for the organization as the mature nurses need not be trained to identify and respond to patients before a cardiac arrest, or assess their airway, breathing and consciousness, and administering appropriate treatment to stabilize them. An RRT team is vital to any hospital because research suggests that RRT teams can reduce the number of patients transferred to ICU with brain injuries as a result of cardiac arrest. Retention of mature nurses can further be increased by providing on-site training programs which would help them to acquire new skills for less physically demanding roles in management and advanced practice that would not be otherwise be available to them (DeWitty, 2005). The hospital can provide reimbursement of the tuition fees for undergoing such training programs. The nurse retirees should also be allowed to work part-time on flexible schedules without affecting their pension. Just as child care is offered to the younger nurses, elder-care subsidy should be offered to the nurse retirees. The retirement process for such nurses should be phased out gradually to derive the maximum from their knowledge and experience. There may be many nurses who suffer from physical problems which is quite common in this profession. Such nurses should be allowed to decide their own schedules of work and be allowed to work just 20 hours per week. They should be engaged in jobs like changing IV tubes, doing admission nursing assessments and just float around the hospital to assist any department that may be short staffed (Roberts, 2005). Thus, the potential of engaging the older nurses in immense which will benefit the hospital, the nurse concerned and the newer nurses in the hospital. They can work as mentors, share their knowledge and experience, have flexible schedules and if physically challenged, they could be given les taxing jobs but all of these would help to overcome the nursing shortage to some extent. References: CARE (n.d.), Rapid Response Team Saves Lives, 02 Dec 2007 DeWitty, V. P., (2005), Workplace of the Future, The Center for American Nurses, 02 Dec 2007 NLN (2006), MENTORING OF NURSE FACULTY, 02 Dec 2007 Roberts, C., (2005), The Nursing Shortage and Our Efforts to Deal with the Impending Crisis, 02 Dec 2007 RWJF, (2006), Wisdom at Work: The Importance of the Older and Experienced Nurse in the Workplace, 02 Dec 2007 Read More