HealthStream Survey Discovers Underutilized Opportunity to Recruit Nurses

Student Nurse Rotations

HealthStream (Nasdaq: HSTM), a leading healthcare technology platform for workforce solutions, today published a new survey of over 5,100 nursing & clinical students who have completed a clinical rotation in 2023 that queried them about their experiences working in a healthcare organization as a student, their future professional careers, and what they valued the most from their clinical rotations. The “voice of the nursing student” with regard to clinical rotations and recruiting is of much interest to nursing schools and healthcare providers alike. The results of this survey were, therefore, initially presented to the Deans of the nation’s nursing schools at their annual meeting earlier this week.

Some of the key discoveries of HealthStream’s survey include the following—among nursing students who completed a clinical rotation in 2023:

• 91% reported that their clinical rotation increased their confidence
• 75% reported that they were not recruited by the healthcare organization where they completed a rotation
• 74% did not have their first job lined up post-graduation at the time of their rotation
• 62% said they would be highly likely to accept a position from the organization where they completed their rotation—if it were offered to them
• The #1 reason why nursing students said they’d accept a job offer was that they observed that “the staff enjoyed their working environment.”

The urgent need for hiring more nurses in healthcare organizations in the U.S. is well documented. There were nearly 3.2 million registered nurses on the job in 2022, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Employment is expected to grow faster-than-average through 2032, translating into about 193,100 openings, annually, on average. Compounding the problem is that approximately 18% of newly hired nurses quit their jobs within one year, while about one-third of nurses report that they’re thinking about leaving the field altogether or retiring. Recruiting nurses is a top priority among most healthcare organizations and continues to pose a meaningful challenge for them.

Nursing educators—from both healthcare organizations and nursing schools—play a central role in helping to close the talent gap. Specifically, the completion of clinical rotations is a critical component in student nurses’ education and preparation for their nursing careers. HealthStream’s unique access to nursing students who have recently completed a rotation is made possible via the Company’s application, myClinicalExchange, which streamlines the journey of clinical rotations between students, healthcare organizations, and nursing schools. When students sign-up for their rotation in myClinicalExchange, they are given a unique “hStream ID,” which grants them membership in HealthStream’s network. Any HealthStream-provided training or certifications completed as a student will then be available seamlessly to them as they take the critical step of joining the healthcare workforce. This makes their transition to practice more efficient—both for the student and the healthcare provider hiring them.