A Workforce Partnership:
Now more than ever, we need to rebuild.
Author: Bree Becker, MSN, FNP-C, RNC-MNN Matchwell Director of Clinical and Quality
Excerpt: UN: The Unconventional Workforce Digest Vol 1, No 2 Letter from the Editor
The American Nurses Foundation published that over half of all nurses report they feel exhausted, 43% report they are overwhelmed, and close to 30% want to leave the workforce. Nurses and their leaders are feeling defeated and powerless.
In “Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents” by Isabel Wilkerson, she compares the structural racism in the US to an old home where the foundation needs to be rebuilt. Her story resonated with me because I see the US healthcare system the same way. Our current healthcare structure is the home where I am to practice. I did not build the house, and many people have lived here much longer than me. There is a foundational issue with the home, and it needs major repairs. Unlike an actual home undergoing remodeling, we (healthcare professionals) can’t move out while it’s renovated. We have to learn to rebuild the foundation and repair the cracks and chipped paint while still living inside the home.
“Together, we are exploring innovative solutions to make healthcare a home where its workforce and residents/patients flourish.”
–Bree Becker, MSN, FNP-C, RNC-MNN
Matchwell Director of Clinical and Quality
Patient care cannot stop because the system is broken. What can leaders do to make the daily conditions of our home livable so nurses and other healthcare workers will stay? This is what the Georgia Nurses Association and Matchwell workforce partnership is doing. Together, we are exploring innovative solutions to make healthcare a home where its workforce and residents/patients flourish.
So let’s do great work — unconventionally, unrelentingly and uncompromisingly.