Month: November 2018

Is the American Healthcare System Near a Labor Crisis?

Healthcare

With advancements in healthcare leading to longer lifespans, medical personnel have to deal with a surge in the number of patients. Although healthcare workers are committed to providing the best care for patients, the current backlog of patients may be more than they can handle. According to current research, there could be a shortage of as much as 104,900 medical staff members by 2030.

Is Healthcare Experiencing a Labor Crisis?

According to College America, the healthcare industry is an increasingly fast-growing job industry in the United States and is in high demand for qualified, hard-working, and caring individuals to join the workforce. Healthcare workers today have their pick from any number of well-paying clinics or practices. But despite this, the situation on the ground shows that we are heading toward a labor crisis. Currently, a large number of nurses and physicians belong to the baby boomer generation. Within the next few years, most of these workers will retire and leave the healthcare industry with fewer employees.

Below are other factors that suggest we are heading toward a labor crisis.

Training Duration

The situation is likely to grow worse since training in health professions takes a significant amount of time. For a person to become a registered nurse, he or she has to work and study for two or more years, while studying to become a doctor or surgeon takes more than nine years, and is incredibly stressful. And to top it off, many healthcare professionals need to invest significant amounts of money into their training and career. Even after school, they need to pay for certifications. For doctors, they will need to oversee not only malpractice insurance, but specific disability insurance for their specialization. It can be overwhelming for many individuals. Unresolved issues exist in our current training of medical professionals. This means it will take some time to replace the retiring nurses and doctors.

State Laws

We should also not forget the fact that healthcare is governed by different state laws. Even if a doctor wanted to go help in another state, he or she would have to check that his or her license would work with a certain regional accreditation. Some states require physicians to be accredited internally before they can practice. This scenario also contributes to the current shortage of healthcare workers because the mobility of physicians is limited.

Turnover Rates

Another factor that shows healthcare is heading for a labor crisis is the high turnover rate, which is higher than other industries. Many healthcare professionals are quitting their jobs at big hospitals and going into the consultation business. Others are just enticed by better offers from other hospitals. An insanely high demand for healthcare workers exists in the United States, and it doesn’t look like the situation is going to ameliorate.

Conclusion

We are on our way to a labor crisis in the healthcare industry. Physicians and nurses are demanding better salaries to compensate them for the increased workload. Going to medical school is becoming more expensive, and few can afford the fees, limiting the number of doctors in training.

If you want to read more related content, be sure to check out similar articles here!

Dr. Antonio Maurice Daniels

University of Wisconsin-Madison

Don’t Be Easily Broken: Develop an Indomitable Spirit

Image result for A Black Woman Crying

Although everyone experiences challenges and problems, one has to decide whether he or she will allow those challenges and problems to defeat her or him. Life will continue to present one challenge, one problem, after another; this is an unavoidable fact of life. Understanding this reality, it’s unacceptable to perceive every challenge or problem that emerges as a crisis.

You can talk about “you don’t know my story” and “you don’t know the things I’ve gone through,” but, at some point, you must be frank with yourself: These statements have become self-defeating crutches. I’m not lacking empathy and undervaluing “your story” and the “things you’ve gone through.”

Here’s my question, though: When are you going to stop using your past in ways that inhibit your growth? And I mean true growth.

Growth is not waking up one morning with optimism and the next with pessimism; optimism the following morning and pessimism the next—a depressing vicious cycle. Real growth begins when you truly start holding yourself accountable for your part in why you’re not progressing and breaking or broken.

Stop focusing on what others are and aren’t doing to and for you. Just concentrate on what you need to heal and grow. In fact, authentic self-care commences when one discontinues investing time in critiquing others and invests more time in developing an indomitable spirit.

How are you engaging in authentic self-care when you’re worried about everyone else? Worried about what everyone else is or isn’t doing to and for you. That’s not self-care—that’s being undisciplined.  

You’re on a path to developing an indomitable spirit when you no longer feel it necessary to concern yourself with how others have mistreated and are mistreating you. One gives himself or herself a chance to operate with an indomitable spirit when he or she takes ownership of what is necessary to own, and when he or she focuses on what is essential to be the best version of himself or herself and what is essential to achieve one’s dreams and aspirations.

If everything defeats you, if every challenge or problem overwhelms you, then you will face a harsh truth: You will maintain a defeated spirit until you’ve truly had enough of it.                

Overcoming a defeated spirit begins with acknowledging it. Next, start living a life of real gratitude. Living a life of true gratitude involves appreciating every moment and finding the goodness in every moment.

An indomitable spirit is rooted in gratitude.

When certain thoughts arise and when you make certain comments, ask yourself a critical question: Are these thoughts and comments rooted in gratitude?

Liberate yourself from a defeated spirit by resolving to live a life centered on gratitude. When you’re intentional about living a life centered on gratitude, you’re well on your way to an indomitable spirit.

Dr. Antonio Maurice Daniels

University of Wisconsin-Madison