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Please direct questions about the magazine or this Web page to Anne Scott.

By Marissa Emerson
Photography by Jason Marsh

As the shortage of nurses reaches epidemic proportions, USF's College of Nursing comes to Florida's aid with a distinctive nursing curriculum. We are facing a crisis in health care, a global shortage of a vital component - nurses. They bring medication, monitor vital signs, change dressings, listen to needs, answer questions, save lives. These professionals are essential to health care, and their low numbers can affect patient outcomes. Florida has the third-worst nursing shortage in the nation, behind California and Virginia, says the American Hospital Association. Florida hospitals have an 18 percent nursing vacancy rate, reports the Florida Hospital Association. The problem is expected to worsen as the state's population continues to age, requiring even more health care services. The FHA projects that Florida will need 34,000 additional nurses by 2006.

USF nursing students like Renee Steiner, left, and Lina Castilla begin clinical training in the first semester of nursing school.

The shortage is no longer looming. It's here," Florida Governor Jeb Bush said in a news conference earlier this year.

At first glance, the solution to the problem seems easy - enroll more students into nursing programs to produce more nursing school graduates.

And the USF College of Nursing is doing just that.

Last year, after receiving approval from the Florida Board of Nursing, the college increased its enrollment from 70 students a year to 120 per year. In the last legislative session, Florida passed the Nursing Shortage Solution Act, which, among other things, allows nursing programs to increase enrollment without board approval if the program has the necessary resources, and increases available scholarship money for nursing students.

"We were getting 300 applications a year and at least 200 were well-qualified to fill 70 slots," says Patricia Burns, dean of the College of Nursing. "We were turning away potential nurses from the college who would sometimes end up going to community college but often would end up just leaving the profession."

Increasing the number of applicants accepted into the program certainly will help produce more nurses.

But then comes the next layer of the problem: retention. Nurses are leaving the field. In fact, one out of three nurses younger than 30 plans to leave patient care.

"The trend is that new nurses leave within one year because they don't have social and transitional support into the work force," says Pat Quigley '75, '82, president of the Florida Nurses Association, and a member of the College of Nursing's baccalaureate charter class and master's program charter class. "What student nurses need is a better understanding of their future work environment and more support systems to facilitate their transition into the profession."

To keep new nurses in nursing and in Florida, the College of Nursing is working more closely than ever with community hospitals.

Steiner cleans a patient's chest wound under the guidance of an R.N. at Tampa General Hospital.

USF nursing educators and nurse leaders from community hospitals created the Clinical Collaborative curriculum, a plan that bridges the gap between academic preparation and professional application of the skills and knowledge a nurse uses every day.

"The Clinical Collaborative opens a whole new area of nursing education," says Burns. "By educating students in an integrated hospital setting, we prepare our students for the reality of patient care and set the stage for a continued relationship between student and hospital upon graduation.

Lina Castilla is one of the first students in the innovative clinical curriculum. Rather than spending weeks adjusting to a new hospital for each clinical rotation, Castilla will complete all of her clinical training at Tampa General Hospital, becoming intimately familiar with that facility.

"I know my way around and feel comfortable," Castilla said. "I have people I can rely on here."

Critical to the curriculum and Castilla's comfort level with TGH is her hospital preceptor, a TGH nurse who volunteers to be a mentor. From her preceptor, Castilla gets a close view of the perks and pitfalls of being a nurse. Preceptors help each student adjust to the patterns and procedures of each home base hospital. They work closely with the college to help the student translate into clinical practice the theories and skills learned each week in class.

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