A new program initiated with the support of the ThedaCare Family of Foundations aims to improve recruitment and retention of emergency department nurses at seven ThedaCare hospitals.
“Recruiting and retaining nurses for emergency departments is a challenge for every hospital,” said Audrey Rosin, RN, manager of emergency services at ThedaCare Regional Medical Center-Neenah. “This new emergency nurse Residency program aims to provide the training and experience nurses need to confidently care for the patients coming to the ED.”
Rosin said there is an opportunity to provide additional training, orientation and onboarding to help nurses be more successful.
The emergency nurses residency program, developed by the national Emergency Nurses Association, is an 18-week program focused on building decision-making skills, improving clinical judgment, reducing burnout, and assisting in acclimation to the emergency department. It includes four weeks of classroom instruction interspersed with hands-on simulation working with experienced emergency department nurses for on-the-job shadowing.
“When their classroom training is focusing on a specialty area, such as cardiology or neurology, the nurses will spend four hours in the cath lab or working on the neuro unit, for example, as part of job shadowing,” Rosin said. “After that, they’ll work with clinical preceptors – that is, experienced practitioners who facilitate the application of theory to practice – from week 6 to week 18, after which they will be prepared to manage patients as a new ED nurse.”
In early 2022 ThedaCare leaders determined the best approach for recruiting new emergency department nurses would be to embrace a new system-wide training program.
“I had been researching how other hospitals and academic medical centers were developing their ED training,” Rosin said. “One of the biggest challenges to creating educational content is that clinical care and medicine changes all the time. What we knew a year or two ago might be very different, so it takes a lot of manpower to keep the educational content updated.”
Then, in May 2022, the ENA announced its emergency department residency program.
“Everything kind of fell into place at that time.” Rosin said. “I presented the program to the chief nursing officer and the vice President of nursing excellence & clinical education, as an opportunity for our EDs. They were both excited. I then reached out to the ThedaCare Family of Foundations.”
The ThedaCare Family of Foundations agreed the program directly aligned with the ThedaCare System goals of hiring and retaining the best talent and increasing patients’ access to expert, local care.
The initial cohort of nurses to b trained began this month with nurses from Appleton, Neenah, Shawano and Waupaca participating.
“We understand it will likely take two to three years to fully experience the benefits of this program,” Rosin said. “I’m encouraged that I’ve already noticed our ED nurses with 10 to 12 years of experience engaging with the program. They are excited to be teaching the content to our new nurses, and they’re learning new things, too.”
The goal is to have two to four cohorts per year to ensure there is a pipeline to fill emergency department nursing needs at all hospitals.
