Medicine: Need for Nurses

In Manhattan, several wards of the vast new Triboro Hospital for tuberculosis have been standing empty since January—there are not enough nurses to run them. In the Midwest some hospitals have closed entire wings, although patients are clamoring for admittance—they have not enough nurses. In Washington, D.C., doctors urged pregnant women to have their babies at home —because hospitals are overcrowded, short of nurses.

This shortage of nurses, said Surgeon General Thomas Parran last week, is a “definite menace” to U.S. health. At least 30,000 more nurses, he admitted, are needed right now for the Army, Navy, hospitals, public health work in rural areas. At present, there are 300,000 working nurses in the U.S., about 100,000 retired. Last year 38,000 new nurses enrolled in training schools; this year 50,000 are needed, says the Public Health Service. Reasons for the shortage: 1) Government health funds have greatly expanded State health programs, have provided more nurses’ jobs; 2) more people can afford to go to hospitals than ever before.

To help train nurses, Congress appropriated $1,250,000 last July. The money will go to 88 accredited schools which applied for grants. Some of the money will be used to train 2,000 new high-school graduates in a regular three-year course. The rest of the Federal money will go toward postgraduate work, and refresher courses in new techniques for older nurses who are returning to work. Back to a Manhattan hospital last week went: a nurse of 47, mother of eleven children; a nurse of 63, retired for 20 years.

To help out, the Red Cross, in cooperation with the Office of Civilian Defense, has started training housewives as volunteer nurses’ aides in 85 hospitals throughout the U.S. The course (in bedmaking, feeding, child care, etc.) is open to high-school graduates between 18 and 50; it takes 80 hours of training, at least 150 hours a year of volunteer hospital work. The goal: 100,000 aides. Twenty-two Red Cross chapters have started classes, 124 more will start soon. Graduates, who work in civilian hospitals, schools and clinics, wear pink uniforms, are called, by the Red Cross, “pink ladies.”