Preparing the Next Generation of Perioperative Nurses

Abstract

Perioperative nursing faces a workforce crisis. There are too few perioperative nurses entering the workforce to replace those who will reach retirement age. Further, the costs of orienting perioperative nurses is high, and turnover rates in the first year after graduation are significant. To address these issues, nursing leaders at Theda Clark Medical Center, Neenah, Wisconsin, and the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh College of Nursing partnered with local medical centers to form a precepted clinical immersion program intended to orient senior baccalaureate nursing students to the perioperative setting. The students were hired after graduation, and the cost savings for orienting each new employee was estimated at $16,000 to $25,000 per student. Other benefits include identifying students who are and are not a good fit for perioperative nursing. The collaboration of health care and academic leaders is one solution for addressing the perioperative nursing workforce crisis.

Addressing the Perioperative Nursing Shortage Through Education: A Perioperative Imperative

“…Prelicensure nurses have limited or no perioperative exposure; as a result, when they join a perioperative department, their orientation can take up to 12 months . The expected shortage of perioperative nurses may negatively affect hospital finances because orienting and educating inexperienced nurses can cost $88,000 per nurse in some areas of the United States .…”

“…Some nursing program administrators and faculty members have integrated a perioperative clinical experience into the existing required clinical courses . Nursing students are able to choose to spend their clinical experiences for a required clinical course in the OR rather than on a medical‐surgical or critical‐care unit.…”

“…Prelicensure nurses have limited or no perioperative exposure; as a result, when they join a perioperative department, their orientation can take up to 12 months. 15,16 The expected shortage of perioperative nurses may negatively affect hospital finances because orienting and educating inexperienced nurses can cost $88,000 per nurse in some areas of the United States. 17 Hospitals can benefit from affiliations with academic nursing departments by helping educate students (eg, offering perioperative clinical rotations at their facility) and then hiring them as perioperative staff members.…”

“…8,50 Perioperative content integrated into required clinical nursing courses Some nursing program administrators and faculty members have integrated a perioperative clinical experience into the existing required clinical courses. 15,46,52,56,74 Nursing students are able to choose to spend their clinical experiences for a required clinical course in the OR rather than on a medical-surgical or critical-care unit. The experience enlists university faculty members, perioperative nurse educators, and perioperative preceptors as clinical faculty members.…”

AORN Position Statement on Responsibility for Mentoring

“…The perioperative setting can be intimidating for new nurses, considering the complicated, diverse, and advanced technology associated with carrying out most surgical procedures 5,8 . In addition, the perioperative setting can be foreign to nurses, since most receive only minimal exposure to the setting in the basic nursing curriculum 9 …”