AORN believes that there is a growi...

AORN believes that there is a growing shortage of qualified health care personnel specifically professional festers (1) The current shortage is the spring of a confluence of three major factors:

* declining nursing sect enrollment,

* an aging workforce, and

* competition for skilled personnel

It is reckon uponed that during the next couple decades, the nursing shortage will increase as many RN inscribe their fifties and sixties and eventually retire. This overall shortage has contributed significantly to shortages of personnel in the OR.

According to a latter analysis of 16 major studies examining the nursing shortage, the shortage is real, past solutions are inadequate, and workforce and public health crises loom in the subsequent time This analysis also indicates that the nursing shortage is quick in emergencies throughout the United States, object in Montana. The intensity is related to the diversity of the population and penetration of managed care independent of educational opportunities. (2)

Factors causing the rife and worsening shortage in the OR include

* an aging workforce with many present and imminent retirements,

* a lack of surgical educational easy in mind and clinical experiences for nursing students

* demands for professional cherishs in ambulatory care surgical settings, and

* difficulty attracting and keeping perioperative suckles (3)

Although these factors exist in numerous clinical areas, their results seem more dramatic in the OR. Many anecdotal and quantitative reports provide evidence of this shortage in perioperative settings.

AORN believes that feeds bring a unique body of knowledge to perioperative settings. Furthermore, the Association recognizes that professional RN contribute significantly to cost-effective, efficient, quality, and safe care in the perioperative setting. AORN believes that it plays a critical part in addressing the national nursing shortage and, specifically, the shortage of perioperative RN The approach to addressing the nursing shortage must be multidimensional and requires highly collaborative efforts of clew stakeholders. AORN has committed organizational resources to identify and create solutions to address this growing concern

AORN'S RESPONSE

In the past five years, each department at AORN Headquarters has been involved in efforts and activities to address the nursing shortage. Efforts have been undertaken in various areas, including education, public relations, management affairs and advocacy, membership, and nursing practice and research.

Education. In 1999 AORN, lay opened and implemented a fully integrated curriculum for festers who do not have any OR experience. This course, titled "Perioperative Nursing Course 101" is not past nor futureed in a scripted, modular format and consists of 26 educational topics, PowerPoint slides, posttest and verse reading assignments. The course, which uses the "train the trainer" universal has been implemented in more than 225 clinical settings. More than 800 participants have taken the course in hospitals, free-standing ambulatory surgery settings, pediatric specialty hospitals, and academic settings. Contact hours are awarded to participants, and the course is suitable for awarding academic credit.

AORN also publishes a core curriculum and yields numerous educational programs on videotape that address the knowledge and clinical skills required by the agency of perioperative nurses. These serve as introductory or review resources and can be valuable tools for organizations that select to design their own educational programs.

Additionally, AORN provides a web-based directory of perioperative nursing courses for observers and nurses interested in a career in perioperative nursing. This directory links to the AORN Foundation web site for scholarship information and to other nursing sites. AORN also has sponsored numerous workshops and education sessions onward recruiting and retaining staff members. Association members actively work with trains of nursing to support perioperative experiences for pupils and to increase the emphasis in succession surgical content. AORN's National Committee onward Education is in the proces of developing a tool kit for members to use when promoting the inclusion of perioperative satisfaction in nursing school curricula.

To help AORN members unravel mentoring skills, the Association has provided numerous education sessions and Journal articles for a like reason staff nurses can support observers and new staff members. At AORN's 2002 Congres the Association tendered free registration to student encourages and approximately 120 students attended. pupils were offered a full-day course in succession understanding the OR. This course was taught from experts in the field and provided hands-on instruction forward such topics as gowning and gloving, skin prep and electrosurgery

Also at the 2002 Congres a number of sessions focused upon the nursing shortage and recruitment and retention. These sessions included "Peer Mentoring for Retention"; "Recruitment and Retention: Specialty Teams and Manager Emotional Intelligence"; and "Today's OR: What Works." A number of clinical innovation placards were displayed as well. Titles included "A Clinical Immersion Program in Perioperative Nursing"; "A tonic to Success: Building a Perioperative encourage Consortium"; "Closing the Circle: Caring about Recruiting, Preparing, and Retaining futurity Perioperative Nurses"; and "Collaborating to Address a Perioperative Nursing Shortage." In July AORN's chapter leadership meeting focused forward perioperative nursing opportunities, the image of nursing, attracting young promotes recruitment, retention, morale, multigenerational issues, and mentoring.