INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana needs nurses. You only have to look at some numbers from the Indiana Hospital Association that show Indiana currently has nearly 4,300 job openings for nurses each year.
According to the association, by 2031, the state will need an additional 5,000 nurses to meet the growing demands of an aging population.
That means on average, Indiana would need to graduate 1,300 additional nurses per year until 2030 to meet the state's current health care needs.
A bill that passed unanimously in the House in the first half of the legislative session went before lawmakers on the Senate’s Health and Provider Services Committee.
The bill’s author, Rep. Bradford Barrett, R-District 56, said the bill will help address the bottlenecks that are slowing down new nurses from entering the profession.
He said some of those bottlenecks involve requirements surrounding training.
Right now, when a student nurse is training at a hospital or medical facility, they’re required to work one on one with a nurse who has at least 18 months experience.
House Bill 1259 gives hospitals the choice of removing that 18-month requirement. Doing so, say supporters of the bill, would allow more nurses to oversee student nurses. The effect of that, they say, would be increasing the number of students who can enter a nursing program, graduate, and join the workforce.
“If someone with less than 18 months has the skills to serve, we believe it’s in the best interest of the students and the state to assign students to this individual,” said Mary Jane Michalak with Ivy Tech Community College, testifying that Ivy Tech currently graduates 1,300 registered nurses per year.
Also under the bill, students training to be respiratory therapists could train with child patients if supervised by a licensed respiratory therapist, but a parent would still be able to decline from having a student work with their child.
Right now, respiratory therapy students can only work with adult patients.
Senators also heard testimony Wednesday morning about the shortage of staff at nursing schools. House Bill 1259 would allow schools to hire more part-time faculty to address that issue.
HB 1259 passed unanimously out of committee and now heads to the full Senate where lawmakers can offer other changes.