UHC/AACN Nurse Residency Program helps members achieve 4.4% turnover rate

The University HealthSystem Consortium (UHC), an alliance of 107 academic medical centers and 232 of their affiliated hospitals, announced today that the UHC/AACN Nurse Residency Program™ (NRP) has helped members achieve an astounding 4.4% turnover rate among first-year nurses. This figure compares with a national turnover rate of 27.1%, according to the PricewaterhouseCoopers' Health Research Institute.

UHC developed the NRP in conjunction with the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) to offer curriculum and support for new graduate nurses. This 1-year program, which provides first-year nurses with tools to adjust to the high pressures of working as a hospital nurse, has shown remarkable success in nurse retention. With the help of content experts, the NRP curriculum has been newly revised to ensure that the content and resources reflect the revised AACN Essentials of Baccalaureate Education.

"New graduates of nursing school often have excellent theoretical and textbook preparation but lack clinical training, which hinders their transition into clinical practice after graduation," said Cathy Krsek, RN, MSN, MBA, director of the UHC/AACN Nurse Residency Program™ and a registered nurse for more than 35 years. "The NRP helps first-year nurses adjust to the complex hospital environment by providing practice clinical training, thereby improving retention rates. As a result, patient care is not compromised, and hospitals save money on turnover costs."

A recent study from the Carnegie Foundation found that "students and faculty alike think that nursing students are not adequately prepared for their first job" (Benner P, et al. Educating Nurses: A Call for Radical Transformation. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2009.) Nurses ill-equipped to handle the job often change employers or leave the profession altogether. An estimated 1 million new and replacement nurses will be needed by 2016, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, and new nurse turnover is a major issue for the health care system. The Carnegie Foundation study authors conclude that "newly graduated nurses should have at least a one-year, high quality, postgraduate residency in a specific practice setting."

The UHC/AACN Nurse Residency Program™ is in place at 61 sites in the United States. Since its inception in 2002, more than 16,000 nurses have participated in the residency program. Last year, 11 of the participating sites achieved a 100% retention rate for new nurses.

"The benefits of the UHC nursing retention program are real and are gaining recognition as an excellent example of how the health care system can appropriately affect nursing turnover issues," said Mary Lynn, RN, PhD, the data analyst for the NRP. "Our program findings were recently presented at Mayo Clinic's Nineteenth Annual Nursing Research Conference as well as at the Institute of Medicine and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation 'Forum on the Future of Nursing: Education.' The data proves this is no fluke—the NRP actually can help the health care system improve escalating retention problems."