Healthcare Economist in Fortune: Labor Market for Nurses
Fortune Magazine had 3 articles providing an overview of the labor market for nurses.
In each article, I am quoted. For instance, I discuss the previous trend of increased use of traveling nurses and why this led to higher wages during the COVID-19 pandemic.
There are two primary reasons wages are rising, according to Shafrin, and they both stem from the pandemic. “Nursing has become a more dangerous occupation, particularly in the hospital setting, and wages need to rise to take this risk into account,” he notes.
What’s more, the health care industry increasingly relies on traveling nurses, which “offer hospitals a more flexible labor force”—but at a cost. Traveling nurses often work for agencies that “charge hospitals more for this flexibility,” Shafrin adds.
I also discuss how the use of digital technology could help offset nursing cost for hospitals.
“The increasing cost of nurses will mark an inflection point where hospitals and physicians increasingly adopt more digital technologies to help monitor—with nurse and physician oversight—patients who are increasingly likely to be treated outside the hospital,” says Jason Shafrin, a senior managing director at FTI Consulting in the Center for Healthcare Economics and Policy, and the founder and editor of Healthcare Economist. “Routine nursing care that follows highly standardized, prescribed procedures could be increasingly conducted by machines.”
Do read each of the articles if you have an interest in where the labor market for nurses is headed.
