The retirement of tenured nurses throughout and following the pandemic has created a knowledge gap across the healthcare system, says Pam Hubley, Vice-President of Health Disciplines and Chief Nursing Executive at University Health Network (UHN) in Toronto.
“With a more novice workforce, we see the impact of those seasoned nurses who had a lot of expertise and who have now retired from the field,” says Hubley. “It’s really important right now that we’re investing in nurses who are coming into the system and focusing on retention.”
To bridge this gap and help maintain the workforce, The Michener Institute of Education at UHN has opened The Michener Centre for Post-Graduate Nursing Education (Michener CNE). The Michener CNE provides nursing professionals the ability to learn the skills and build up the capacity to meet the emerging challenges of the modern healthcare system.
“Professional development is crucial to nursing,” says Klara Malkova, Course Coordinator and Instructor, Critical Care Nursing at Michener. “Nurses seek out employers that will provide them with opportunities to grow and develop, so by providing continuous professional development, nurses will not only want to work at a hospital but will also stay there.”
As a school within a hospital, Michener has the unique ability to incorporate the latest evidence-based practices into courses taught by experts within their field. Through the Michener CNE, organizations can help both individual or groups of nurses advance their knowledge and develop specialized skills to ensure current and high-quality patient care.
Programs have been designed to integrate hands-on experience, mentorship and virtual learning to provide nursing professionals with a flexible, hybrid learning model of education.
Hubley says hospitals and organizations need to keep the training of their nursing staff at the forefront, for the operation of their care centres and the health system as a whole.
“It’s really important that we have strategies such as education support, investment in learning and education for nurses, to help keep them in our system,” she says. “Nurses are those key members of a team who help coordinate and ensure that the right care is delivered.”
“It’s so important to have highly skilled nurses in hospitals and on the care team.”
https://michener.ca/nursing-education-programs/
