Skip to Content Request Info

Are you thinking about becoming a nurse?

Are you thinking about becoming a nurse?

Which Way is the Wind Blowing? Decision = Destiny

The winds are back in Kansas City! It’s (almost) a welcome signal of spring after a dark, cold winter. Somehow, I can’t help but think about the wind as a signal of spring as a parallel with the dark, cold winter of nursing we’ve been in since Covid became a household word. But I have to ask… are we there yet? Has nursing actually entered any signal of a change of seasons for it’s embattled front-line nurses?  Some think there are positive signs. Are you seeing anything you would place in that category? Maybe more focus on nurse retention initiatives that actually matter to the nurses? How about you – are you sensing any wind shift within you that might point in another direction in your life?

As I talk with nurses, the top two needed changes identified are employer incentives for nurses to stay – i.e. retention – and doing more to attract new candidates to the profession. The belief “on the street” among nurses is that the media coverage of the exhausted faces of nurses on the frontlines night after night during the Covid pandemic hurt student nurse recruiting efforts and may have contributed to attrition from the nursing profession. The bleed continues from the nursing profession -- but the opportunity to join the nursing ranks and contribute to a transformation of the profession as a whole – “new blood” – is wide open! The clarion call to seriously consider nursing as a career option is intensifying. The staffing shortage has created a crisis on the heels of the pandemic.  Just think about it – anyone who joins the profession now has a prime opportunity to impact the nature of the profession because it is in crisis. This is a high impact moment for new nurses.

The bottom line? Nurses are in high demand due to the unprecedented global nurse staffing crisis. Due to the level of crisis which currently exists, high impact change within nursing, and on behalf of the profession of nursing, is possible. “New thought” as well as “new blood” are needed to move this possibility to reality. Especially post-Covid, nurses are calling for the day when the status of nurses as health care professionals in their own right, worthy of an equal level of respect as other healthcare professionals, is the norm. What may not be apparent is how the nurse role ended up married to and buried in large healthcare systems and bureaucracy over the last 100 years, and what it will take to blast it out of there into a more equitable standing, one with role autonomy.

Are you seeing possibilities for yourself as a nurse, i.e. the “new thought” needed to invoke change? Or are you seeing possibilities for yourself as someone who could become a nurse and be part of the “new blood” needed to bring about change? DECISION = DESTINY. Yes, this is true. We make Decisions which Determine our Destiny. There is no time like the present to make that decision which will take you on the path to your destiny. And do we have a deal for you! If you are a nurse seeing possibilities to join the ranks of the “new thought” change, Ottawa University’s RN-BSN or MSN programs have a “break-out of the old way of thinking and being” opportunity for you. If you are someone thinking you could be part of the catalyst group to bring about change as “new blood” into nursing, Ottawa University Nursing is awaiting approval from the Kansas State Board of Nursing to launch the new pre-licensure BSN program, hopefully later in 2023. 

Posted: 03/09/2023
Updated: 03/09/2023 by Dr. Ruth L.M. Burkhart, DNP, MA, RN-BC, LPCC
Back to top