The Miami Herald from Miami, Florida • 5

WEDNESDAY JUNE 1 1994 THE HERALD 5A Nursing grads face tight job market Perks bonuses and frantic recruiting of the are history Some hotels black out Ch 7 news Jane Mass vice president for nursing services She partially credits the end of the drought to a hospital program that pays full tuition for nondegrecd nurses who go back to school Earning a or degree widens work opportunities for nurses and sets them up for better pay started during the shortage time but continue to do that Mass said Nursing school administrators say there are jobs for nursing graduates but it takes longer to find them And they say it remains difficult to fill some nursing specialty jobs Among them medical-surgical and intensive care unit nurses as well as nurses who specialize in emergency room and maternal-child health care In addition health care experts predict that while hospitals will continue as major employers of nurses places like outpatient clinics and home health care agencies will need greater numbers of nurses in the future Nurses in those settings need a higher education level and the ability to function autonomously And there may be another shortage looming The aging of the baby boom generation at the same time as the current crop of mostly older RNs is beginning to think about retirement could create another shortage beginning in the year 2010 government studies indicate NURSES FROM 1A need as many nurses Some duties traditionally done by higher-paid registered nurses have been passed on to lower-paid licensed practical nurses nursing assistants or other staffers with less medical training The recent economic rcces- sion pushed more experienced nurses back into the work force There are more young nurses out there these days As demand rose the profession beckoned many newcomers partly because salaries improved and hours became more flexible In 1993 the average starting salary was about $36000 for a general hospital registered nurse according to the American Journal of Nursing Three years earlier it was about $26000 Also recruitment efforts worked Nationwide enrollment of first-time nursing students in degree programs rose 10 percent this year the fifth straight year of enrollment increases In Florida enrollment has been on an upward curve since 1990 No job yet Marilyn Glace a Dania resident who graduated last month with an undergraduate nursing degree from Florida International University has applied for work at six hospitals in Dade and Broward counties Still no job places are indicating they are not hiring graduate nurses It leaves me feeling a little frustrated and WSVN FROM 1A North Miami Beach started the trend by blocking Channel 7 all day long not just the newscasts from TVs in his 340 rooms Channel 7 issued a statement Tuesday afternoon is unfortunate that this is their wrote Robert Lcider executive vice president and general manager of Sunbeam Television Corp owner of WSVN is our job to cover the news and we will not censor our newscasts to placate the hotel Hewitt in a letter to Channel 7 anchor Rick Sanchez last week said his frustration with WSVN had the breaking need to express our displeasure with the company and just keep urging them to mosey up to the Channel 6 way of doing Hewitt said Tuesday Last month CBS-owned WCIX-Channel 6 instituted "family news which deletes violent footage for its early evening newscasts The action shouldn directly hurt Channel fortunes hotels measured in the Nielsen survey so there's no fallout in the loss of advertiser said Tom Fraioli owner of Communications Counselors in Miami Fraioli noted that Channel news earned low ratings in the May sweeps see how that does he said based on the reaction to Channel 6 it look like Channel 7 will be running to change its RECEIVED COMPLAINT: Rick Sanchez Tom Julin a media lawyer with Steel Hector Davis said he knew of no legal problems in the action would depend on the agreements with cable he said hotels are subscribers I think Channel 7 would have any way to require their signal to be put through to the Hotelier Farkas said his complaint about Channel 7 is that doing an injustice to local residents and especially to tourists They look at Channel 7 and afraid to go out on the Whether the action will have any far-reaching consequences is unclear Stu Blum-berg president of the Miami Beach Hotel Resort Association said his group taken up the issue Neither has the Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau said President Merrett Stierheim is not a program the bureau is Stierheim said is the decision of individual hoteliers Victor just acted He was tired of the damage I heard a public relations person say that Channel 7 is Kevorkianing their own ager of human resources at Mercy Things have changed At Plantation General the vacancy rate for nurses soared to 15 percent during the nursing shortage days The hospital used pay incentives to lure new recruits and began training nurses already on staff for hard-to-fill specialties like neonatal care Today the hospital has 300 registered nurses and only about three openings said assistant director of nursing Barbara Simmons But she remains on the lookout for nurses specializing in intensive and coronary care Meanwhile the hospital continues to train nurses from its staff to fill jobs requiring specialized skills At Jackson Memorial Hospital the vacancy rate for registered nurses has slid from about 10 percent in the late 1980s to no more than 2 percent today said Glace said During the shortage days when some hospitals were forced to turn away patients because they have enough nurses to care for them recruiters could never have envisioned a slew of freshly graduated nurses knocking on their doors had to practically plead and beg for people to come in for an recalled Pat Kane who arrived at Mercy Hospital as a recruiter in 1987 Back then the vacancy rate for registered nurses was about 20 percent starting nurses made about $25000 a year Today Mercy's vacancy rate is about 4 percent and starting nurses make about $30000 Most of the 1 5 jobs open at Mercy require specialist nurses who can work in the operating room or critical care section Only two are for nurses right out of school For staff nurse jobs almost a said Kane man f'V 4 TLvV II tr mm Flag 37 C3 7' sgp-- itfe A A 'o to Selections Specially Priced FAMOUS NAME DRESSES SI Misses Petites Women 25 to 50 Off Specially Priced Special Occasion Dresses Misses Petites Women From elegant mother of the bride to bouncy party cocktail dresses in crepe silk cotton chiffon brocade beaded styles Orig 7999 to 28000 specially priced 59-99 to 139-99 25 to 50 Off Specially Priced Soft Romantic Dresses Misses Petites Women Summer-soft shirtdresses tank sundresses tunics babydolls fit flares In sheer georgette gauze rayon crepe Orig 8000 to 17400 specially priced 39-99 to 129-99 69-99 to 99-99 Pantsuits Palazzos Misses Petites Women Summery one-piece palazzos jumpsuits and softly structured pantsuits in rayon 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