Florida nursing shortage needs urgent attention, group says

Florida's nursing shortage will become "crippling" in a decade unless health officials quickly train many more nurses and retain more of the ones they have, according to a report from the state-funded Florida Center for Nursing. The current shortfall of 11,000 registered nurses would balloon to 52,000 by 2020 and would start to hurt healthcare within six years if the situation does not improve soon, according to the report. To avoid a huge shortage, the report estimated that registered-nurse graduates would have to rise by 15% yearly. Also, the report urged hospitals to try harder to retain nurses, such as by easing workloads and stress.