Though the footing is still unspecific, healthcare reform has the world of nursing attracting talent and earning much due respect through necessity.
Anne Barker, chair and professor of nursing for the Sacred Heart University Nursing Program, said health care reform is a call action in nursing education.
“It is going to be putting money into primary care, which means that nurses are going to be called upon to be more educated,” Barker said.
She said over the next few years there will be a push toward developing nurse practitioners as a more central part of the health care services world and more recognition in the doctoral profession.
The education of nurses has been held very high since the ”™70s but it is just now being given the recognition and face time, said Barker.
She said with shortages in primary care physicians, nurse practitioners stand to inherit the majority of the burden of a soon fully insured and must-be-treated public. If the Congressional Budget Office estimate proves to be accurate, 19 million additional Americans will carry health insurance when the individual mandate becomes law on Jan. 1, 2014 with another 13 million on records by 2019.
“This legislation greatly increases access to care for tens of millions of people and will strengthen and improve the healthcare system for generations to come,” said Rebecca Patton, president of the American Nursing Association.
The Public Health Service Act programs have become the primary source of federal funding for nursing education.
Barker said the education push will help insure that there will be enough nurses in the future to care for the masses who will need healthcare. Barker said nursing program enrollment is up at Sacred Heart University.
Major grant programs will be providing grants to nursing schools and academic health centers to enhance master”™s and post-master”™s programs. The legislation also removes the 10 percent cap on grants for doctoral education. There are also grants being put into motion to help people from disadvantaged backgrounds, grants to support schools and nurses at the associate and baccalaureate level. Loans are to go into place for a nurse education loan repayment program to repay 60 percent of nursing student loans in return for at least two years of practice in a facility that has a critical shortage of nurses, and loan programs within schools of nursing to support students pursuing master”™s and doctoral degrees. The loans will come with upon-graduation service requirements, similar to the U.S. Army system.
Barker said the reform”™s nursing provisions are an example of the federal government taking note of the additional needs of the health system, and taking action to move new and practicing nurses toward the doctoral levels of advanced practice.
“This is going to have a major impact on the world of nursing,” said Barker.
She said the difference between the reforms”™ effect on doctors and nurses is that at the core is an attempt to improve the complete management of care.
A prime example of the draw of the world of nursing is Kandree Hicks, a family nurse practitioner at the Norwalk Community Health Center. Hicks grew up in Norwalk as a student at the Columbus Magnet School. A self-taught bilingual who holds a dual bachelor”™s degree at the University of Connecticut and a master”™s degree from Cornell, Hicks went on to study at Yale University School of Nursing receiving a master”™s of science in nursing in order to become a family nurse practitioner.
“In that decision it was reflective of my thirst to understand people, what makes them tick, and that translated easily into a career where I can help people directly,” said Hicks. “I chose nursing in primary care because I wanted to work holistically with patients, focusing on wellness, not just disease.”
Hicks”™ hire is part of the Norwalk Community Health Center”™s expansion. Having recently moved into a new larger and greatly improved facility on Connecticut Avenue, the center is seeing first-hand a growing need to service.?“Kandree is an example of the kind of medical professionals we are bringing on staff who can provide excellent care to our patients mixed with a larger sense of caring, said Lawrence Cross, executive director of the center.
“That”™s why people chose sometimes to be a nurse rather than a doctor, nursing has a real emphasis on caring for people,” said Barker. “Physicians are more focused on treating acute illness.”
Barker said, though it is an exciting time in the nursing and education industry, the payout of what exactly will happen in terms of health care reform law is still a very much ”˜wait-and-see”™ situation.
