1.6M nurses are set to leave by 2029, deepening the workforce crisis

The nurse-force shortage is hitting critical capacity – and it’s poised to get worse.  According to a new report from the National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN), more than 138,000 nurses have left clinical care since 2022…and a further 1.6 million (that’s around 40% of the current workforce) have expressed an intention to switch careers by 2029. 

This is on top of the approximately one hundred thousand nurses who quit patient care during the pandemic, indicating that the number of available nurses may be shrinking faster than ever before. 

The survey of 800,000 nurses found some familiar themes around why nurses are becoming disillusioned with the profession. Stress and burnout topped the list, followed by overwhelming workloads, the unsustainability of understaffing, not enough compensation, and the threat of workplace violence. 

“We can no longer use COVID-19 as an excuse as to why nurses are leaving the workforce,” said Phil Dickison, NCSBN Chief Executive Officer. “We can infer that while hospitals continue to prioritize investments in mental health and other support services for nurses since the pandemic, structural issues that predated the pandemic remain.”  

Clearly, healthcare organizations need to adopt new strategies to attract and retain qualified nurses. While there are certainly opportunities to offer more competitive compensation packages with more attractive benefits, the changes need to go beyond the basics and address how to reinvent the way nurses perform their duties in an environment of scarcity and stress. 

Technology will obviously play a major role in this reimagining. For example, digital tools to address the burdens of administrative tasks, such as documentation, accessing necessary data, and communicating with care team members, have the potential to trim up to 20% of the time devoted to these activities per 12-hour shift.  

Related Content: CompassionIT – Starting with a May 20 virtual summit on embracing innovation with empathy, DHI’s special focus on the evolving relationship between compassion and technology in healthcare includes articles and special events.

Meanwhile, smart hospital rooms can incorporate virtual nursing staff, interactive digital displays, AI-powered patient monitoring, ambient listening devices, and automation of the physical environment to give patients more control over their experience while reducing the need for nurses to be present in the space for tasks that can be completed from a centralized location instead. 

But tech is only part of the answer because administrative burdens are only part of the reason why nurses experience career-ending burnout. Nurses are more likely than other frontline providers to experience rampant disrespect: from patients and from their peers.  And in one recent survey from Medscape.com, more than half of nurses said their employers don’t adequately recognize the problem, leaving them to struggle with frequent professional and personal affronts on their own.  

As a result, 40% say they express their frustration to other members of staff, while 30% admit they might snap at a patient when feeling overwhelmed or under attack. 

Creating a safer and more supportive work environment that protects and empowers nurses who are dealing with disrespect will be an essential component of the quest to strengthen the dwindling nurse-force.  

Addressing long-standing, deeply structural challenges facing frontline nurses won’t be easy, especially as a large number of experienced Baby Boomer generation clinicians start to leave the workforce at the same time as their contemporaries start to require more and more healthcare services.  

It will take a combination of digital solutions, policy changes, and organizational improvements to stem the tide of fleeing nurses and retain enough experienced, high-quality clinicians to meet the nation’s unprecedented demands for clinical care over the next few decades.  

Jennifer Bresnick is a journalist and freelance content creator with a decade of experience in the health IT industry.  Her work has focused on leveraging innovative technology tools to create value, improve health equity, and achieve the promises of the learning health system.  She can be reached at [email protected].