Rural hospitals can't find enough nurses to fight Covid-19

Rural hospitals and clinics have had a hard time recruiting and keeping enough skilled workers for decades, but the pandemic has made it worse.

"Across the country, thousands of hospitals are overwhelmed with critically ill patients, prompting many overburdened nurses to change careers or retire early. The shortages are particularly dire in rural areas, rural health experts say, because of the aging workforce and population, smaller salaries and intense workload," Aallyah Wright reports for Stateline. "Rural health care leaders have begun offering sign-on bonuses and benefit packages to combat shortages during the pandemic. But they’ve found that even those perks aren’t enough to keep or attract skilled health professionals. Instead, they say, the focus needs to shift to boosting nursing school enrollment and getting workers into the field faster."

The problem is so dire that Nebraska hospitals are recruiting unvaccinated nurses, and one Kentucky hospital is so short-staffed that administrators are considering allowing infected but asymptomatic nurses to work in Covid-19 units. 

The pandemic is hitting rural areas—and their hospitals—especially hard because of lower vaccination rates. Some of that stems from lack of vaccine access, but mostly it's a function of vaccine resistance, Jill McKeon reports for PatientEngagementHIT.