ANA Responds to Outrageous Op-ed

ANA President Barbara Blakeney, MS, RN, CS, ANP, has written a letter in response to a column by Dan Thomasson, "This profession needs nursing," that has appeared in newspapers around the country. ANA encourages nurses to write letters to the editor of newspapers that published the column and to Mr. Thomasson directly at thoassond@shns.com.

July 26, 2002

Dear Editor:

I am sure nurses, doctors and health care consumers alike were disturbed and offended by Dan Thomasson's column (July 24, "This profession needs nursing") that sought to promote Dr. Dworkin's absurd and offensive thesis about the factors driving today's growing worldwide shortage of nurses. I am offended by their misogynistic arrogance and their specious arguments as well as their attempt to blame nurses for the current state of the profession, which in many ways mirrors the overall state of our health care system today.

First of all, all of the health professions are facing shortages, not just nursing. Certainly, in many ways, nurses, as the largest of the health care professions and the 24/7 caregivers, are bearing the brunt of the burden created by a dysfunctional system that is more cost-focused than care-focused. They (Thomasson and Dworkin) imply that nursing's evolution as a profession over the past 100 years has devalued nurses and contributed to poor working conditions and a lack of interest in the profession among young people. They also imply that a "back to the future" approach will solve the nursing shortage. It is hard to believe any rational person would think that nursing's past – educating nurses in hospital-based diploma programs, producing indentured servants with limited options for career advancement, rather than in institutions of higher education, and requiring nurses to wear dresses and be "virtuous"– is the answer to a 21st century labor shortage.

Nursing today is a profession characterized by high stress due to unmanageable patient loads, mandatory overtime, exposure to health hazards, a rising incidence of verbal abuse and physical violence, and voluminous paperwork, as well as flat wages and low overall career earnings. These are among the reasons health care facilities are facing a shortage of nurses.

In order to both retain today's practicing nurses and to recruit more people into the profession, nurses' working conditions and wages must be improved. Equally important, nurses' contributions to the health care team must be recognized and respected. A recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, which found a direct link between increased nursing care and better patient outcomes – that is, fewer complications and fewer deaths – is a case in point. More research on how nursing impacts the quality of care is needed, as well as greater recognition of nurses' contributions to quality, cost-effective health care.

In addition, patients today require the sophisticated skills and compassionate caring of highly educated nurses. Congress has recognized this need; that is why it recently passed legislation that supports nursing education, as well as efforts to promote the profession as a career choice and to retain practicing nurses.

I do agree that the crux of the nursing shortage centers around the image and value of nursing. For that reason, national nursing organizations have united around a shared vision for the future of the profession and developed a comprehensive strategic plan to address the complex, interrelated factors that have created this potential health care crisis. The plan, Nursing's Agenda for the Future, focuses on strategies that will move the profession forward in quantum leaps, thereby ensuring that adequate numbers of well-qualified nurses are available to provide high-quality nursing care. For more on Nursing's Agenda for the Future, see: www.NursingWorld.org/naf.

Sincerely,

Barbara Blakeney, MS, RN, CS, ANP
President
American Nurses Association
202-651-7011

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The American Nurses Association is the only full-service professional organization representing the nation's 2.7 million Registered Nurses through its constituent member nurses associations. The ANA advances the nursing profession by fostering high standards of nursing practice, promoting the rights of nurses in the workplace, projecting a positive and realistic view of nursing, and by lobbying the Congress and regulatory agencies on health care issues affecting nurses and the public.

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