Earlier this year, we reported some of the results of the state of the U.S. healthcare system by Wolters Kluwer. But what about the state of U.S. nursing? That’s today’s discussion.
Wolters Kluwer on Next-Generation Nurses
Although the survey was done pre-COVID-19, this report from Wolters Kluwer references the impact of COVID-19. Let’s present a few highlights:
Social distancing. Panic buying. Flattening the curve. Those are some of the expressions we started using at the beginning of 2020.
And even though the lives of nurses across the world have changed dramatically — perhaps permanently — since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the words we use to describe nurses are still the same: Resilient. Selfless. Powerful.
Nurses are the true heroes who serve on the front lines of patient care. They bring not only care but also hope to patients in need. Even at times of great personal risk and under sometimes suboptimal conditions, the world’s nurses unite in a common mission to defeat an invisible enemy. And they have been at patients’ bedsides despite the lack of hospital equipment, the under preparedness, and in many cases, the necessary protective gear.
The survey results yield insights based on the views of a group of next- generation nurses (in practice less than 10 years) who are tuned in to today’s rapidly changing healthcare system. The responses reveal those nurses’ confidence and social savvy—qualities that are certainly helping them navigate the perils of the pandemic and that are also making them the best poised to navigate changing care models.
The survey results also show that these nurses are making their mark. They’re bringing a new perspective on such topics as societal needs, the patient’s role in care, technology, the opioid crisis, and continuing education for nurses.
It’s become a very different world, but we hope we can learn from the generational characteristics of this committed group of nurses, who are among the best positioned to sustain the profession while becoming key architects of what the future healthcare system might look like.
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