Running Head: THE GLOBAL ISSUE OF NURSING SHORTAGE

The Global Issue of Nursing Shortage

Alyssa Brown
Kellogg Community College

Abstract

THE GLOBAL ISSUE OF NURSING SHORTAGE

This paper explores the global issue of nursing shortage by including five research
articles that explained the reasoning for the continuous shortage of nurses worldwide.
This paper explores the different methods used to come to the conclusions of some of the
explanations for nursing shortage being a global issue. Some reasons and explanations of
why nursing shortage is such a global issue are because of the specific work environment,
educational programs, and migrations. Going more into detail about these specific topics
will pursued others to get involved in the nursing field instead of running away from it.

THE GLOBAL ISSUE OF NURSING SHORTAGE

The Global Issue of Nursing Shortage

In the health care field, there is a continuous discussion of nursing shortage

throughout the world. Hospitals, clinical care providers, and medical centers are always
looking to hire more nurses to their team to provide as much care as possible, but the
question asked by several individuals is why are almost all health care providers
worldwide have nursing positions open no madder how many nurses are on their team.
Nursing Shortage has been a global issue for several years because of the work
environment, educational purposes, and migration.
The work environment is a dramatic cause of why several people chose the job
they do, not many are willing to take risks and go into work environments that are
constantly busy or where there is a huge commitment involved with helping others. In the
nursing field, one of the reason there is an endless shortage occurring, is because of the
work environment nurses are introduced to. According to Janiszewski (2003), 80% of
nurses surveyed indicated that they did not feel entirely safe in their current workplace
(p. 338). Being a registered nurse (RN) in health care, nurses are exposed to several
different things that most people are not comfortable being around. Janiszewski (2003)
states that, consequently, it is evident that there are many variables that contribute to the
changing RN work climate, and at present is appears that most nurses are not satisfied
with these changes (p.338). Barnett (2010) explains that the work environment in
Malaysia is improving by, include more realistic workload determinations that focus
on the professional patient care responsibilities of the RN and better reward both
educational and experiential achievements (p.37). Even though the work environment is
a huge importance when deciding on a job, there is a lot more to take into consideration

THE GLOBAL ISSUE OF NURSING SHORTAGE

when thinking about the nursing field.
Going to college to get a degree in the job someone wants to do in the near future
can be a challenge. All jobs related to the health care field tend to be more challenging
than some of the jobs out there. There is a lot of prepping, memorization, and hands on
activities in the nursing field that can be very difficult for a range of individuals,
especially in different parts of the globe. Educational programs to become a nurse are
very different around the world and making it harder for an individual to be pursued into
the job field. Today, in Australia, nursing students are required to get a Double Degree
(DD) to become a registered nurse (Hickey 2010, p.52). Several students in the nursing
field in Australia drop out of the program because of the educational requirements. Nardi
(2013) discusses how nursing programs in the United States are, abandoning the
apprenticeship model for clinical education, pooling teaching learning resources,
designing and using the same databases across organizations to track and project faculty
needs, ending associate degree nursing education programs, and collaborating between
schools and businesses to create mutually beneficial agreements for services (i.e.,
international faculty exchanges, professional development for staff, and preceptors for
students), nursing faculty capacity can be enhanced, and nursings capacity
to meet global healthcare needs can be expanded (p.324). In consideration, education is
not easy to go through for any field, especially nursing, but in the end the education pays
off big time.
Migration is another issue in several countries relating to the problem of nursing
shortage. Nurses go to other countries trying to seek better jobs or job offerings that pay
better by leaving everything behind to see what another location may offer. According to

THE GLOBAL ISSUE OF NURSING SHORTAGE

Benton (2013) nursing migration, in the past ten years there has been an increased
awareness of the impact of faculty shortage in producing sufficient numbers of highquality nurses (p.158). Several nurses leave there designated home to find a better
nursing job elsewhere that pays a lot better and has a more efficient way of running
things. What a good amount of countries around the globe have found out is that all the
nurses that leave their workforce leaves more spots open for more nurses, which has now
become an issue for several years. Nurse faculty are those individuals who, in addition
to a professional qualification, also have preparation as educators. In the World Health
Organization (WHO) Report concentrating on human resources for health, it was
recognized that shortages of these individuals were a limiting factor to rapid scale-up of
global nursing capacity (Benton 2013, p.158). Migration is an issue that needs to stop; if
it were to stop there would be less job openings for nurses all the time.
The global issue of nursing shortage has several reasons and explanations why the
shortage of nurses is a continuous occurrence not just in the United States but worldwide.
The nursing shortage in the health care field is mainly because of the work environment,
educational programs, and migration. Knowing these examples and explanations why
nursing shortage is such an issue the job market and educational programs are doing
whatever they can to increase the job growth of nurses. Knowing more about the work
environment, educational programs, and different countries nursing jobs would pursue
others into becoming more interested in the field causing less of a shortage.

References

THE GLOBAL ISSUE OF NURSING SHORTAGE

Barnett, T., Namasivayam, P., & Narudin, D. (2010). A critical review of the nursing
shortage in Malaysia. International Nursing Review, 57(1), 32-39.
doi:10.1111/j.1466-7657.2009.00784.x
Benton, D., Gonzlez-Jurado, M., & Beneit-Montesinos, J. (2013). Nurse faculty
migration: a systematic review of the literature. International Nursing
Review, 60(2), 157-166. doi:10.1111/inr.12008
Hickey, N., Sumsion, J., & Harrison, L. (2010). Nursing double degrees: a higher
education initiative in times of nursing shortages. Australian Journal Of
Advanced Nursing, 28(1), 52-59.
Janiszewski Goodin, H. (2003). The nursing shortage in the United States of America: an
integrative review of the literature. Journal Of Advanced Nursing, 43(4),
335-343. doi:10.1046/j.1365-2648.2003.02722_1.x
Nardi, D. A., & Gyurko, C. C. (2013). The Global Nursing Faculty Shortage: Status and
Solutions for Change. Journal Of Nursing Scholarship, 45(3), 317-326.
doi:10.1111/jnu.12030