As the nursing workforce tries to stabilize, nurses must be involved in its transformation to improve the nursing profession and the delivery of healthcare. The Oregon Center for Nursing conducted a visioning tour to collect nurses’ perceptions of their profession and to identify the steps they feel are needed to improve the healthcare system.
Nurses often express dissatisfaction with heavy workloads and how they feel they are being treated in the workplace. Nurses do not believe they are being heard and decisions are being made without their input. These focus groups were specifically designed to recognize the nurse’s voice, solicit their engagement, and gain insight into the current and future state of the nursing profession from a nurse’s perspective.
Five broad themes were identified that summarized commonly discussed topics across all the focus groups. Briefly, nurses are passionate about their profession and believe nursing is an essential component of the healthcare system. However, nurses do not like how they are treated in the workplace and recognize that incivility exists even among themselves. Nurses feel strongly about shared governance and believe they should have a say in how healthcare is delivered. Although, they often feel disempowered and believe no one listens to their ideas.
Overall, nurses have a positive view of nursing as a profession but expressed dissatisfaction with their role perception and lack of value recognition within healthcare. Many nurses feel disrespected, dismissed, and unsupported. The themes identified can inform organizational policy, work structure, and day-to-day operations impacting the nursing workforce. Namely, the focus group participants suggested the healthcare system of the future needs to be co-created with nurses through shared governance, developing a professional culture, and promoting self-advocacy. In short, nurses must have a prominent role in leading change within healthcare.