The Nursing Shortage in Canada: Challenges, Causes, and Solutions

This essay provides an in-depth analysis of the nursing shortage in Canada, a critical issue affecting the healthcare system. It explores the challenges faced in retaining and recruiting registered nurses, highlighting the impact on medical facilities and patient care. The essay examines the causes of this shortage, including an aging population, migration of healthcare personnel, and the demanding nature of the profession. It further discusses the consequences of the imbalance in the nursing workforce, such as increased workloads, potential errors, and financial implications for the healthcare industry. The paper also suggests potential solutions, including financial incentives, improved work environments, and expanded roles for nurses to address the crisis and ensure quality healthcare for Canadians. The essay also highlights the need for strategic human resource management and policy changes to alleviate the shortage and improve the healthcare infrastructure in Canada.

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Running Head: AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
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1AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
Nurses are coined as one of the most crucial professionals in the healthcare system. Their
contribution is considered as vital in achieving developmental goals in delivering effective and
safe health care facilities. The most common challenge for varied developing and developing
countries is the lack of proper human resource availability and its maintenance, whereas the most
significant one being the availability of nurses be it in a local, regional national or a global
perspective British Columbia and the entire nation in Canada is facing strict challenges in
retaining their registered nurses, which in turn is negatively effecting the standard of medical
facility in the country. The shortage of nursing is generally not measured directly, but
specifically highlighted by the prevalence of diseases, availability of technology (including
advancement of drugs/vaccinations) and public expectations. Thus, this essay will specifically
highlight on this medical crisis existing in Canada and how the country plans to deal with this
present existing crisis.
Non-profit and independent organization, The Canadian Institute for Health Information
(CIHI) that specifically deals with information regarding the Canadian health system, thus going
by its statistics In the past 10 years Canada did witness 0.7% gowth in its working nurse
force(Braithwaite et al., 2017). It is very evident that the high demand of nurses which has
exceeded its supply, Canada is facing such constrains in medical infrastructure. Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development has suggested certain basic reason, which has fuelled
this shortage of nursing in Canada. This imbalance of demand and supply of quality nurses in
Canada can be accounted to certain specific reasons, such as: the growing amount of aging
population in Canada, coupled with a very minimum number of individuals joining this specific
profession generally due to the low social value given to nursing and availability of better

2AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
professional growth in other sectors of employment (Udod & Care, 2012). Moreover, migration
of health care personnel have a very serious impact on the overall availability of nurses in the
country. The basic reason behind such immigration can be lack of proper pay structure or any
other personal reason. Quebec another significant nursing association predicts its own crisis of
11000 nurses between the year 2001 and 2015 (Palley, 2013). Another significant problem,
which has been highlighted in this shortage of nursing in Canada, is that the potential nurse force
is ageing and there is no remarkable influx of new nurses in the country. This is seriously
threating the quality of medical facility provided by the hospitals. The imbalance in the
retirement and recruitment procedure of new
This labor shortage in the nursing profession can be attributed to varied reasons. One
primary reason is the excessive workload coupled with the poor work environment. The National
Review of Nursing Education stated that the lack safety of the nurses, insignificant recognition
of efforts, insufficient pay and curbing out the autonomy of qualified nurses often lead to
emotional taxing on the professionals which compel them to leave the profession (Moore &
Dienemann, 2013). Professional satisfaction is directly linked with the retention and performance
appraisal of the professionals. However the current working environment assured to the nurses in
Canada lack the supply of the necessary infrastructure as well as appositive work environment to
ensure productivity. Thus, a revision in the whole management and organizational structure of
the health care and nursing industry might help the nation retain and recruit nurses in a better
manner. A closer look on the nursing landscape of Canada shows Ontario is the most affected
region in this country, which is facing extreme nursing staff shortage. Statistics and data released
today by the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) states that Ontario has the worst
registered nurse-to-population ratio, which is only 669 registered nurses per 100,000 people

3AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
compared to 828 registered nurses per 100,000 people across the rest of Canada (Nardi &
Gyurko, 2013). This shortage is highly attributed to issues like poor communication, weakening
nurse-patient relationship, improper ratio of availability of nurses as compared to the number of
patients being admitted every day (Bobbio, Bellan & Manganelli, 2012). Much attention needs to
be given to factors like improving interdisciplinary team work measures along with ensuring a
proper and safe work environment to the nurses in Ontario to establish a proper check to the
falling statistics of employed nurses in the medical industry.
There is no doubt on the fact that nurses play a very significant role in improving the
medical infrastructure. Nurse as a profession, is dedicated for a twenty-four seven-work service.
Nurses are often attributed as the unsung heroes of the global economy. Thus, nurses play a very
crucial role in promoting healthy lifestyle practices which ensures a healthy living. Nurses not
only affect in the quality of health care facility but also directly influences in developing a
framework of policies about how exactly care should be given. The Public Services Health and
Safety Association (PSHSA) has underlined the most critical challenges that the nurse face being
in this profession. Nurses often complain of the high risk they face being in a profession of
saving others life. According to Henrietta Van hulle ,the executive director of PSHSA: nurses
have been extremely mistreated such as from being physically abused to extreme psychological
trauma of being verbally abused apart from being extremely over buderned with unbearable job
pressure and horrifying work environment (Maughan, Bobo, Butler & Schantz, 2016) . Thus,
this shortage of nurses and an imbalance in the demand and supply of the nurses in Canada in a
vicious circle which includes determinants like absenteeism, quit, early retirement,
discouragement to new recruits, stress, vulnerability to injury, disability, burn out more work and
overtime (Auerbach, Buerhaus & Staiger, 2014)

4AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
The most significant impact of this imbalance in the nursing availability structures has
directly impacted in establishing a monopoly in the nursing profession. This shortage of
registered nurses has led to significant increase in the demand of unreasonable hourly wage, an
undue demand of increasing the incentives of nurses and varied other nonmonetary benefits as
well (Sharma & Klocke, 2014). The internal monopolistic structure often leads to the formation
of unions, which in turn help the nurses to stand organized in the nurse labor market. This often
led to sudden disruption in the smooth functioning of the nursing industry where the aftermath is
felt by the patient population at large. Thus analyzing the above instances the statistics show a
very clear picture of how low infrastructural conditions of the medical industry in Canada often
compel nurses to migrate to varied other developed nations. The shortage of nurses undoubtedly
affects the overall health care system. Lack of adequate number of nursing staff directly affects
the wellbeing of patients, leading to an increase in patient morality rate, increased number of
medication error, overcrowding of emergency departments and altogether worsening the living
condition of the Canadian population at large. The nursing shortage is invariably affecting the
business prospects and profit-figures of the healthcare industry as well. In 2016, it was recorded
that going by the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) reported that the nursing
turnover in hospitals was estimated above 16% (Crisp & Chen, 2014). Over 92% of hospitals
reported that their Emergency Department was experiencing acute problems of overcrowding
and exposing shocking figures which claimed over 81% of patients were devoid of getting beds
who were in emergency condition. Going by the statistics of Bureau of Labor Statistics, by the
year 2024, the healthcare industry will be looking forward to welcome more than 1.09 million
new nurses (Chu, Wodchis & McGilton, 2013). The statistics and data presented clearly states
the depleting condition of the nursing sector in Canada.

5AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
Industry experts are continuously working and analyzing the health care industry market
in Canada for developing and providing a range of solutions intended to improve the overall
scenario of recruitment and retention of nurses in Canada. For instance, the Nursing Education
Loan Repayment Program (NELRP) is a selective program and a constructive initiative by the
U.S. Government dedicated towards alleviating the critical shortage of nurses by offering loan
repayment of up to 85 percent of outstanding loans to registered nurses as well as for advanced
practice registered nurses (Trpanier et al., 2013). An increase in the funding will substantially
help in designing better training of the nurses along with a visible revision in the non-
competitive salary structure of nurses cab be of a great aid in this nursing crisis existing in
Canada. Most importantly ensuring a safe, progressive and encouraging work environment for
the nurses that helps them develop their skills as well as give them their due respect is very
crucial to preserve the sanctity of this profession. Different financial and non-monetary
incentives are used to affect health workers supply and/or demand. For instance, grants and
scholarships are examples of incentives that can be used to attract more nursing learners, while
salary rises, extra advantages and flexibility in working hours are examples of incentives that are
frequently used to attract or maintain health workers. The medical industry experts are of the
opinion that healthcare services in 2030 would not be just limited to either hospitals or just to
primary care clinics (Chuang, Liu, Lu & Lee, 2014). In order to sustain in this dynamic
environment, the registered nurses in Canada must expand to better reflect their specialized
knowledge and skills and take strong initiative in actively advocating the public policies that
ensures all Canadians get adequate access to healthcare facilities along with healthy living
condition because there exists a direct and very close link between social conditions and health.
Since a healthcare system cannot function in isolation or without a healthy environment,

6AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
registered nurses are expected to promote and understand the importance of ensuring safe food
and water consumption, clean air, and sustainable environmental practices to bring remarkable
improvements in the health index of Canada (Day, 2013). It is of no doubt that the health care
industry is definitely expanding, which can be either accounted to the growing rate of population
which brings in more health related concerns, and in turn has brought in high demand for nurses
which is also expected to show a projected growth of almost fifteen percent between 2016 to
2026 (Oostveen, Mathijssen & Vermeulen, 2015).
The current form and nursing structure in Canada involves a lot of crisis leading to a
great imbalance in the overall availability of nurses in Canada. It calls for an immediate action
both by the government authorities as well as the by the doctor fraternity to act immediately
upon the current scenario and bring viable solution to the same. The above suggested ways not
only aims at improving the number of nurses available in the medical industry but also focuses
on improving the overall quality of medical infrastructure in Canada.
Nurses make up the healthcare system's biggest group of healthcare suppliers. Successful
recruitment and retention of nurses is very crucial for healthcare organizations with a current
domestic and nursing shortage. Nurses are potential enough to find positions in any healthcare
setting. Hospitals recruit almost more than half of the using workforce (Hoeve, Jansen &
Roodbol, 2013). The human resource management function primarily includes: planning,
recruitment, selection, training and designing of an appropriate reward system for maintaining
the staff population in hospitals. Even the most potential nursing managers do recognize the
impact that planning has when it comes to implementation of strategies for extracting the most
effective results. As a beneficial human management strategy, the nursing managers are best

7AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
advised to develop a proper action plan or strategic structure to extract the exact human
resources issues from its employees (Kim, Lee, Chun & Benbasat, 2014)The management team
must critically emphasize on assessing proper feedback as well as most importantly include
nurses in the decision-making process. A Fresh hospital management initiative is required to
involve itself and make the human resource management department actively tackle this shortage
of nursing. Hospital management can provide organisational support, the necessary leadership
from the human resource management department as well as a well-defined measuring tool from
the financial managers to adopt a retention or balanced approach to the solution. Proper
professional development is considered as an excellent tool for substantially increasing the
retention of the nurses as well as improving the performance of the professionals. It also helps in
better engaging the professionals through development initiatives like workshops, staff training
programs, getting access to clinical instructors and so on. However, the most significant role that
the human resource management department needs to ascertain is in building and developing a
positive work culture environment (Mohammad & Mosadeghrad, 2013) Collaborative coupled
with inter-professional teaming can be cited as a very beneficial management strategy to manage
acute problems of employee retention.
Thus it cannot be over emphasized what important role does the human resource management
strategies play in obtaining and retaining nurses in Canada where nurse staffing is considered as
an acute problem. Maintenance of human resource is both an art and science. It requires proper
understanding of human potentials and harnessing the best out of the available candidates.
Thus from the above cited discussing it can be concluded that what are the exact reasons
for Canada to undergo such an acute nurse staffing problem. The problem gets more severe when

8AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
there is an unprecedented growth in the population rate which actually implies growing number
of health diseases and more requirement for hospital care and nurses on one hand while on the
other the falling number of registered nurses in the country. The above mentioned
recommendations aim at nullifying this imbalance to ensure a positive growth in the lifestyle
index of the population. Even the Canadian government officials have suggested few crucial
strategies that can be adopted to beat this nursing crisis existing in Canada. The measures that
can be adopted include: increasing the productivity of the registered nurses. This indeed makes
the government plan for better training and learning facilitates for the nurses, a strict check on
the rate of absenteeism of the registered nurses (Masselink & Jones, 2014). Advanced nursing
practices are developed and nurtured by the hospitals for improving the existing Canadian
nursing operations. Proper maintenance of patient records along with designing therapeutic plan
of care. Arranging for proper family counselling and education sessions for better understanding
and cost-effective diagnosis of diseases. The acute problem of nurse staffing requires immediate
attention of the government officials along with the unions and varied other professional
associations because the health index of any nation altogether ascertains the size of productive
individuals in a country. Thus for a country like Canada it is very crucial to address these
scarcity issues in the most tactful and prompt manner. .

9AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA
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12AN INSIGHT ON THE NURSING SHORTAGE IN CANADA