Outline of Plan Nurse Turnover Offering employees advancement into another specialty after one year of employment can help increase retention. It will give nurses that option most of them are looking for when beginning their employment at a facility, but at the same time secure their current position for at least a year. After a year they may not want to transfer units, they could have developed a fondness for their current specialty or the people they work with.
Giving employees an incentive to stay longer will in turn give them time to socialize with the other employees. Hopefully this method decreases nurse turnover. Nurse turnover costs the hospital $22,000 to over $64,000 per nurse turnover (Jones & Gates, 2007). These sots come from a variety of things such as, advertising and recruitment, vacancy cost (i. E. , paying for agency nurses, overtime, closed beds, hospital diversions, etc. , hiring, orientation and training, decreased productivity, termination, potential patient errors, compromised quality of care, poor work environment and culture, dissatisfaction, distrust, loss of organizational knowledge, or additional turnover Cones & Gates, 2007). Benefits of Staff Retention There are many benefits to nurse retention such as, patient safety and quality of care, patient satisfaction, nurse satisfaction, and nurse safety Ones & Gates, 007).
Financially, the benefits of nurse retention are reduction in advertisement and recruitment costs, fewer vacancies and reduction in vacancy costs, fewer new hires and reduction in hiring costs, fewer orientates and reduced orientation and training costs, maintained or increased productivity, fewer terminations and reduction in termination costs, decreased patient errors and increased quality of care, improved work environment and culture, increased satisfaction, increased trust and accountability, preserve organizational knowledge, and easier nurse recruitment (Jones & Gates, 2007).
With these benefits employees build a stronger bond with their co-workers and work cohesively as a team. Strategies for Nurse Retention Many times after new nurses complete their orientation period, they no longer have any support. Being in a new environment can be stressful and these new nurses feel alone and unsupported. By offering continuous support for the first year of employment ensures these nurses do not get burned out or quit.
Some other strategies for nurse retention are staying in-touch with the new employees, conduct weekly meetings to deal with any issues or concerns, reward longevity ND preceptors, a lot of preceptors feel “put out” during orienting, rewarding their efforts can make them feel appreciated, recognize quality, every one likes feeling appreciated for their hard work (Mercado, 2012). Nurse retention has been shown to have many benefits, including the quality of patient care improving and the money it saves hospitals.
Having a good orientation process is very important and is a great tool for improving nurse retention. For this reason and others, hospitals should make sure to have a good orientation process in place. Continuous support after the orientation process is also helpful or many new nurses and will help decrease the turnover rate.
