In her Daily Nurse article, “Nurses Are in Dire Need of Better Mental Health Care,” Lynne Gross, president of RNnetwork, shares three factors that contribute to mental health struggles for nurses, as well as where the industry should focus its efforts to improve mental health care.
“My company recently conducted a nationwide study of the challenges facing modern nurses, and learned that nearly half of all respondents (49%) had considered leaving nursing in the past two years,” Gross writes.
One of the biggest problems nurses face, according to the article, is the persistent nationwide shortage of registered nurses.
“The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicted 1.2 million vacancies would emerge between 2014 and 2022, and 91% of nurses reported that their hospitals were understaffed,” Gross says. “In 2016 we issued our first study on the welfare of modern nurses. At that time, 62% reported that the growing shortage had negatively affected their workloads. In our recent study, the number had skyrocketed to 88% of nurses.”