Study: Nursing shortage gap closing

As a Medical Technologist for 30 years I have witnessed the shortage of nurses as early on as 1976. Regulations regarding how many RNs'and LPNs ratio for good patient care meant larger numbers of nurses were needed to give this kind of quality healthcare. I've witnessed the salaries increase accordingly also. As a Medical Technologist all I have seen for the Lab Field is shrinking budgets, salaries not comensurate with experience and I won't even mention the ages of those of us still in the business. What will the Doctors, Nurses and Hospitals do without us? American colleges offering this degree have shut down because of low admission rates and costs of equipment, etc. Because there are more nurses they get more attention, but it seems very little is being said about Med Tech field. Why not get to the nitty gritty on this area of the health profession that because of the aging personnel will impact your industry squarley on the head in about 5 years. Time to delve real deep into this crisis because Doctors and Hospitals don't seem to give a flip if they only have 2 techs doing the work of 5 people each. Surely, the same could be done for the Med Techs as they have done for the Nurses, huh?

Nurses can easily do a tech's job but can a tech do a nurses job? That explains why nurses are so invaluable and should be given more $ and respect.

I don't know who Anonymous is but they need to look up the duties of a Med Tech. RNs cannot do the job of Med Tech because we haven't been trained as an RN who first wanted to be a Med Tech, but got married and had 2 children first I do know the difference. I appreciate well trained Med Techs knowledge of new and unusual labs ordered and their ability to perform the test. Also please don't try to add another job to the RNs list, we are already very overworked. Just to make the Med Tech feel better one hospital I worked at paid entry level Med Tech 2 dollars more on the hour than entry level RNs. I'll continue to support you guys and help you get your samples if you'll report he results. Hang in there you are treasured.

Barbara and "old RN" have hit on a timely topic and Barbara is correct in stating that the focus on the nursing shortage does not address the real and true issue: the shortage of all health care workers (outside of the medical profession). Having worked in an oncology/hematology setting, I can attest to the importance of timely lab results and the need for an adequate number of techs to do the job with accuracy and efficiency. Even though a number of the lab results may be automated, there still remains a significant amount of preparation and storage of samples in order to get accurate results. Treatment decisions depend on accurate results and patient outcomes (especially in life-threatening illnesses) are directly related to accurate results.

While good nurses are needed to provide direct patient care, especially in the acute care settings, effective and quality nursing care is dependant upon a number of allied health professionals. These include not only med techs, but respiratory therapists, physical and occupational therapists, social workers and patient counselors.

The entire system is resting on the edge of implosion unless we can come up with some creative solutions and an honest introspective look at the situation at hand.

I could contribute to making up the gap by bringing qualified Turkish nurses to The States and need a partner to commence the business.Anyone interested.

Thank you so much, whoever you are, for defending med techs!!! I am sooo tired of feeling unappreciated. The average med tech in this country is within 10 years of retirement. There are not enough graduates, and of those that do graduate from a med tech program, MANY of hem switch fields (myself included). It's just not worth the hassle. We have more education than nurses but get treated like crap by everyone!!! They have NO idea how hard med techs work.
And someone actually thinks a nurse can do a tech's job??? Please!!! They wouldn't know the first thing about working up antibody patients and it's not something you learn with a couple hours of training.
Health care administrators are in for a rude awakening in the near future.