Effort Aims to Boost Maryland's Supply of Nurses

An initiative by the Maryland Hospital Association will provide $15.5 million over the next five years to 17 nursing schools across the state to help increase the number of students in the programs and stave off a predicted shortage of nurses.

The plan will be financed through donations from health-care providers, insurers and individuals who are concerned that the average age of nurses is rising at the same time aging baby boomers are expected to increase the demand for medical care.

Programs that will receive the grants include Montgomery College, Prince George's Community College, Anne Arundel Community College, the College of Southern Maryland, Howard Community College and the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing.

"We're getting older, getting ready to retire, and the demand is going to increase," said John M. Colmers, secretary of the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.

About 33 percent of the state's population will be older than 50 by next year, and those numbers are expected to grow to nearly 40 percent by 2020, according to the Maryland Department of Planning.

"People are living longer, are more healthy, more active, and they want to stay that way," said Catherine Crowley, vice president of the Maryland Hospital Association.

Maryland will require 10,000 more nurses to meet those needs, Crowley said.

Moreover, the average age of nurses in Maryland is 47, and 43 percent of nurses plan to retire in the "next few years," said Nancy Fiedler, a spokeswoman for the Maryland Hospital Association.

The problem, though, is not a lack of students pursuing nursing as a career. Nursing schools throughout the state are crowded, turning down more than 1,000 "qualified applicants" each year, Crowley said.

Colmers, secretary of the state health department, said the potential crisis boils down to "having enough seats in the classrooms and people teaching in the classrooms." The grants are aimed at helping the nursing schools take in more students and hire additional faculty.

Although the hospital association says it has commitments for $15.5 million, its fundraising target is $60 million over five years.

Such an investment is needed, Crowley said, because nursing education is expensive. In addition to the 360 more faculty members needed in Maryland nursing programs, the schools have to buy medical technology and build laboratories.