Washington, D.C., is experiencing a nursing shortage that is heavily impacting the healthcare system as hospitals struggle to maintain necessary staff levels to care for patients.

The District of Columbia Hospital Association (DCHA) has struggled to retain enough nurses to meet the intense demands of the COVID-19 pandemic, a pattern mirrored in hospitals across the country. While many people have adjusted to living life as they did before the pandemic, nurses remain particularly strained, as the 7-day average of patients in hospital service areas in and around Washington, D.C., hospitalized with COVID-19 in the District sits at 149.

In 2021, more than 100,000 registered nurses left the workforce, the largest drop in the past 40 years. According to a Nurse Staffing Survey published in September by the DCHA, nearly 80% of nurses working in hospitals and facilities in D.C. say they have to deal with staffing shortages more than once per week, placing increased strain on nurses.

Georgetown School of Nursing Associate Professor Diane Davis said nursing shortages in the United States are not solely a result of the pandemic, but that they stem from a larger strain on nurses in the workplace.

“I think it started before that and I think nursing has been running with a nursing shortage for a very long time,” Davis told The Hoya. “I don’t know that there’s ever times where you feel like you’re flushed with nurses. It’s kind of an ongoing problem.”

Prior to COVID-19-related stressors, nurses reported feeling burnout from the strain of long hours, the pressure of quick decision-making that may affect patients’ health, and the strain of caring for patients who may not fully recover. Nurses’ feelings of stress and burnout can be increased by nurses who are forced to care for a larger number of patients, those who work longer hours, and those who specialize in stressful areas of healthcare, such as Emergency Department and ICU nurses.

This nursing shortage does not show signs of easing any time soon. According to research conducted by consulting firm McKinsey & Company on the impact of COVID-19 on the nursing workforce, by 2025, the U.S. could have anywhere from 200,000 to 450,000 fewer registered nurses than necessary to meet patient demand. 

Davis said the School of Nursing at Georgetown prepares future nurses for the challenges they may face in a strained healthcare system. 

“We do a fair amount of work for wellness in nursing and how to take care of yourself and your colleagues and how to set up situations where you work that can promote wellness because nursing can be very difficult,” Davis said. 

Maddie Flynn (SON ’24), a nursing student, said that Georgetown nursing students recognize the issue of the nursing shortage in the workplace.

“Nursing is a highly collaborative field — being surrounded by a cohort of such driven and passionate peers that are supportive in the classroom makes me hopeful for support for our future after we graduate,” Flynn wrote to The Hoya. “We all recognize the high demand of our field, but are inspired by our professors and clinical faculty every day in class and the hospital.”

Flynn said she has seen the impacts of the shortages affecting her clinical rotations at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital (MedStar), a key component of her nursing education at Georgetown, in which students spend time with members of the medical field in a hospital setting.

“We do clinicals at MedStar, and a lot of times we’ll see nurses that are caring for six or more patients, which isn’t typical and while they’re able to manage it, you can tell they’re more stressed out than they would be if there was a better ratio,” Flynn wrote. “I’d say overall the worst part about having a nursing shortage is that you aren’t able to devote time in a more meaningful way to each of your patients.”

Despite challenges, many nurses continue to stay in the field due to their passion for the work, Davis said.

“It’s a very rewarding profession, but it can be a very difficult profession. A lot of people that go into nursing take care of other people, but at the expense of themselves,” Davis said. “But there’s a lot of pressures: work more shifts, work more hours, and fill in for this person so we try to also work with that. They need to take care of themselves as well.”