bailey button ugg boots uk State may spotlight Humboldt County
Editor note: This is the initial installment of in Humboldt, an ongoing monthly series profiling health challenges in Humboldt County and what being done to overcome them.
By Will Houston and Hunter CresswellThe state next month may recognize Humboldt County as having a nursing shortage. Several local health officials told the Times Standard it at least a start, but more will be required to solve the long running shortage and its consequences.
there is a shortage in our area. It been going on for a long time, Humboldt Del Norte Medical Society president elect and local physician Stephanie Dittmer said Friday. just been exacerbated by the closing of the nursing program at [Humboldt State University]. it long waits for emergency room beds or fines from the state for patient care violations, the signs of the nursing shortage at local institutions are sometimes readily apparent, officials said. Local hospitals and nursing homes are relying heavily on temporary traveling nurses to fill the staffing gaps in the meantime.
leads to such a turnover of care that you have to re train the nursing staff on a regular basis, Dittmer said about traveling nurse staffing. just jeopardizes patient care over the long term. while the potential designation of the county as a registered nursing shortage area by the state could open up funding to train local health care providers, reinstating a local nursing bachelor degree program would have the greatest effect in building the ranks of local nurses, officials said.
will be a single most impactful measure our community can take is to restart a nursing training program, Dittmer said.
Efforts have already been underway for a year by Humboldt State University, College of the Redwoods and other community leaders to create a nursing bachelor program, with officials now eyeing fall 2019 for the inaugural semester.
Local nursing as it stands
The number of registered nurses in the county is on the rise, according to the most recent data provided by the California Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development.
In 2006, the number of active registered nurses in the county was about 1,340. By 2016 it increased slightly to 1,406, with numbers fluctuating in the years between.
But 2018 will be the first year the county will be considered for a nursing shortage area designation by the California Healthcare Workforce Policy Commission, which is set to occur at the commission Feb. 27 28 meeting, according to the state. The designation is based on a formula that takes into account the number of days that beds at local hospitals and skilled nursing homes are used as well as active nurses in the county.
This year, the numbers aligned so that the county can now be considered for the designation, having fallen just short last year, according to state data.
Institutions that train primary heath care providers in counties with the designation are given extra consideration as a part of a state program that provides financial support for health care training programs.
designation that recognizes the shortage of local nursing staff and helps give us some tools to encourage more people to go into the field and to get more training opportunities is important not only for the nursing homes, but also the hospitals, the clinics, the hospices, to everybody, said Rockport Healthcare Services CEO and geriatrician Michael Wasserman, whose company manages four of the five operating nursing homes in the county.
the entire health care continuum that is hurting by not having enough trained staff in the area. your own Door Community Health Centers Director of Nursing Janis Polos said that as more local nurses near retirement age, younger nurses are needed to take their place.
After HSU ended its nursing program in 2011, Polos said the region lost its ability to generate nurses who are qualified to fill certain positions that require a higher degree of training than a certified nursing assistant or licensed vocational nursing certification.
Many of these nursing students who trained at local institutions were more likely to remain in the area after their graduation, Polos said. Polos said she was a graduate of the HSU program and taught for it during its final years.
that program went away, the flow of people with that level of training or education went away, she said.
In the meantime, local health care institutions have worked to make up for the loss through programs to train prospective nurses, nurse assistants and nurse practitioners, who each are able to provide different levels of care based on the level of training.
At Open Door, Polos said they have clinical rotations for nursing associate degree students from College of the Redwoods as well as nursing students from Chico State University and UC Davis. She said they also have a residency program for nurse practioners and physician assistants looking to further their training with Open Door and St. Joseph Hospital creating a similar program to attract physicians.
Rockport Healthcare Services conducts certified nursing assistant training at its Fortuna nursing home and the Eureka Adult School, according to Wasserman.
St. Joseph and Redwood Memorial Hospitals chief nursing officer Tammy Bark said the hospitals in Eureka and Fortuna are staffed with excellent nurses and that they are currently recruiting but stopped short of saying there is a nurse shortage at the facilities.
always trying to recruit. We backfill with travelers when needed, she said.
Bark didn detail any recruitment specific programs but said they offer current nurse staff advanced training, a new nurse residency program and fellowships that help nurses train for specialty positions in surgical, labor and delivery, critical care and other departments.
you have a program like that it attracts applicants to your hospital, she said.
Bark said traveling nurses takes burden off staff.
always staff to Title 22 ratios, she said referencing regulations that require for a certain number of nurses for a certain number of patients.
The ratio depends on the department and varies from one nurse per every five patients, up to one nurse per patient, Bark said.
