Where Have All the Nurses Gone?

At 6:30 A.M. a head nurse reviews room assignments and the day’s challenges ahead: twenty-nine patients, most of them seriously ill, and four nurses to care for them. That means a barely manageable and potentially risky patient-nurse ratio of seven to one, with one nurse taking eight patients. Unfortunately, this dismal scenario is played out again and again in hospitals across the country.
This in-depth, behind-the-scene’s account of a healthcare system under stress and the declining quality of medical treatment in America should serve as a wakeup call to the public. Faye Satterly, a Registered Nurse with over two decades of experience, spells out the alarming statistics: The average nurse today is forty-five years old and anticipating retirement. Only 12 percent of nurses are under age thirty. At the same time, nursing schools report decreasing enrollments and fewer graduates. The result is that the nurses who are on the front lines of healthcare are feeling overwhelmed and leaving the field for less stressful opportunities outside hospital settings.
Compounding the looming crisis is the fact that just as nurses are becoming scarce, the need for them is becoming ever greater. Over the next decade, aging baby boomers will swell the ranks of the over-fifty-five population, a group that experiences higher healthcare needs than those in their thirties and forties.
There are answers, the author insists, but they will require an honest public debate about our choices and expectations. What are we willing to do and how much are we willing to pay for safe, effective delivery of healthcare?
This fascinating and disturbing account by a veteran nurse with extensive experience is a compelling call for action to counter the nursing shortage and ensure that "caring" regains its premium status in healthcare.

Satterly (Cancer Services Director, Martha Jefferson Hospital) offers a behind-the-scenes account of a healthcare system under stress and the declining quality of medical treatment in America, looking at factors that are driving professionals to leave nursing and students to choose other fields. She invites readers to experience one day in the life of a nurse and one day in the life of a hospital executive, then discusses hospital economics, how hospitals can retain nurses, and issues of accountability. Appendices list organizations. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Library Journal

A registered nurse, Satterly (cancer services director, Martha Jefferson Hosp., Charlottesville, VA) offers touching testament to the effect of the nursing shortage on the remaining nurses in the field and their ability to provide patient care. Through the eyes of fictionalized characters who represent real people in real situations, the author exposes readers to issues such as work stress, job dissatisfaction, and the pressures of a growing number of nursing specialties and hospital economic woes. Oddly enough, Satterly only briefly discusses how to address those problems. Six appendixes cover nursing organizations, specialty nurse organizations, groups supporting nurses (with reviews of some of their activities), help with advance directives, fighting obesity, and information for kids. Though selective, the lists in these appendixes do include contact information and web sites. There is also some sound advice for the patient. The personal, moving tone makes this work suitable for the public; researchers, however, would be better served by Nursing Shortage: Strategies for Recruitment and Retention in Clinical Practice and Education, which describes both the shortage and the steps to alleviate the crisis.-Margaret K. Norden, Marymount Univ. Lib., Arlington, VA Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Faye Satterly, R.N. (Charlottesville, VA), is Cancer Services Director at Martha Jefferson Hospital. She has been a Registered Nurse for twenty years, and served as Cancer Services Director for twelve years.