“Retaining high-quality, healthy, and well-educated nurses is vital to health systems’ capacities to provide patients with safe and evidence-based care. Research consistently demonstrates the benefits to patient safety when hospitals are adequately staffed with qualified nurses. Yet, estimates show over one-third of nurses have expressed some intention to leave their jobs and that approximately 1 in 5 nurses leave their jobs annually.
In the Southeastern United States, nurse turnover and intent to leave are particularly acute relative to elsewhere in the nation. The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated working conditions for many nurses, accelerating trends with increasing numbers of nurses leaving, or planning to leave their positions, and even the profession. Identifying scalable approaches to promote workplace well-being and foster nurse retention is urgently needed
to stymie continued losses to the nurse workforce.”