More Fresno nurses are nearly ready to help fight coronavirus. So what’s stopping them?
California’s nursing shortage is poised for another setback as nursing students are turned away from the hospitals they need to complete their training amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Fresno City College’s Registered Nursing Program graduates more than 100 nurses each semester, but that could change as all but one Fresno-area hospital – Saint Agnes Medical Center – has stopped accepting students for clinical rotations – the hands-on training that must comprise 75% of a nursing student’s training.
The drop is likely due to fear of exposure to the coronavirus and to conserve supplies, according to Alicia Lozano, assistant director of the Registered Nursing Program.
If nothing changes, the central San Joaquin Valley could lose nurses at a time when the state is bracing for a shortage of health care workers, protective supplies and ventilators due to rising coronavirus cases.
The Valley already has fewer nurses than the U.S. average.
There are about 600 nurses per 100,000 people in the Valley, while the country’s average is nearly 1,000. The shortage is projected to grow worse by 2035, according to a report by the Healthforce Center at UCSF.
Nursing students adjust
Molly Savage is in her third semester of the nursing program, and she says while it’s not ideal to learn without being in the hospital, “you gotta do what you gotta do.”
She’s adjusting to taking in lectures on Zoom from her house, and only going to campus every other week for simulation classroom training. The nursing program is one of the few classes at Fresno City that still meets on campus. Most other courses have been moved online through the summer.
“I think we’re all worried because we want to work,” Savage said. “This is our career we’ve chosen and the school’s trying their best. They’re doing everything they can. There’s really not much more we can do.”
“We’re in a situation where we have to kind of take our learning into our own hands at this point, and be responsible, just like we’re gonna have to do when we’re RNs for real.”
Scrambling for solutions
Savage and students across the state are hoping for a lifeline from the state and the California Board of Registered Nursing.
Over 100,000 people have signed a petition asking the BRN to soften its requirements, as some students are only weeks away from graduating.
The Bee reached out to the board, but a spokesperson said she was unable to comment.
Lozano said if the board doesn’t relax the requirements, “then we’re going to have to wait till they (students) are allowed back in the hospital and then they can make up those hours.”
Other states, such as Virginia, have already passed executive orders that waive the patient contact requirement. Now nursing educators have asked California Gov. Gavin Newsom to do the same.
Delaying graduation of nursing students will significantly impact public health, according to the letter sent to Newsom from the California Association of Colleges of Nursing and the California Organization of Associate Degree Nursing.
At Fresno State, the CSU system is requesting that nursing programs have a one-time curriculum change, so virtual simulation and patient contact are each 50% of instructional time, according to Sylvia Miller, chair of the School of Nursing.
Nursing on the frontlines
A temporary solution to a nursing shortage caused by the coronavirus pandemic would be letting near-graduating students help out in hospitals.
Senior year nurses have already been called upon in Italy, the United Kingdom, and New Jersey.
During Monday’s coronavirus update, Newsom said he was exploring letting nursing students near the end of their training join the coronavirus work force. He did not specifically address changing the clinical requirements or whether students would be fast-tracked to graduation.
Lozano said Fresno City’s four-semester program has many students ready to help in the event of an overload of patients.
“The fourth-semester students are learning the critical care aspects of nursing,” she said. “They have most of the skills of a new graduate nurse and can help in the capacity that the hospital partners, the BRN and local authorities allow in an emergent environment.”
“But currently, Fresno is not doing that yet,” she continued, “which is why we continue to push through our virtual clinicals and in the classroom as we are doing today, to try and give them just one more day of skills if we can.”
The Education Lab is a local journalism initiative that highlights education issues critical to the advancement of the San Joaquin Valley. It is funded by donors. Learn about The Bee’s Education Lab at fresnobee.com/education-lab.
This story was originally published March 25, 2020 at 2:52 PM.