Health care staffing challenges continue: Miller Report for March 14, ’22 (column)

Editor’s note: Dr. William Miller, chief of staff at the Adventist Health Mendocino Coast Hospital, is writing weekly reports concerning the COVID-19 situation on the Mendocino Coast. We are pleased to be running his health column, with details on the medical fight against the pandemic. The views shared in this weekly column are those of the author, Dr. William Miller, and do not necessarily represent those of The Mendocino Voice or of Adventist Health.

On October 4^th, I reported on the national shortage of healthcare workers and how this affects us locally. Six months ago, when I wrote about it, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics indicated that there were over 290,000 unfilled healthcare positions across the country and it was predicted that this would increase by another 35,000 by the end of 2021, with 1/3 of the total being in registered nurses. Unfortunately, these estimates were off by a large margin. The American Hospital Association (AHA) reported in January that the actual shortage at yearend was closer to 600,000, mostly nurses, and they predict another 500,000 healthcare worker jobs will be vacant by the end of 2022, bringing the potential total to 1.1 million. AHA has called the ballooning shortage of nurses in America a “crisis that demands immediate action.”