Nursing Education and Retention, a Pen Bay Priority,
Gets $500K in Federal Funding

A nursing education and retention initiative at Penobscot Bay Medical Center will be getting a boost from $500,000 in federal funds.

This regional program will benefit people in Knox, Lincoln and Waldo counties. It is designed to retain experienced nurses, train and mentor novice nurses, increase clinical training opportunities for student nurses, and enhance patient care, said Paula Delahanty, PBMC vice president of nursing.

"Pen Bay Healthcare is deeply committed to this program. It is important to the people of Midcoast Maine and to every member of our organization," said Delahanty.

In partnership with University of Maine at Augusta, Pen Bay plans to host additional student nurses per semester for their clinical rotations, providing the venue, permissions and professional interactions required for this program and receiving in return the ability to recruit more new nurses.

The Pen Bay nursing initiative is a $1.3 million program funded by the federal appropriation and other funds committed or raised by PBH.

The federal funds were in the FY 2010 Department of Labor and Health and Human Services, and Education spending bill, approved by the Senate earlier this month and signed into law by President Barack Obama. The bill included a total of $4.74 million for Maine projects.

"We are extremely grateful for this funding. Our nursing workforce has an average age of 52. If we do not take action now to increase the number of nursing students graduating and entering the profession, we will experience a profound shortage in the next two decades," said Delahanty.

Midcoast Maine is experiencing the same nursing shortage as communities around the U.S., though in some ways, here the need is more acute, said Delahanty. Fifty-two percent of PBMC's 400 nurses are older than 50, compared to 40 percent nationally. In the coming decades, many of these highly qualified and reliable nurses will be replaced with a new workforce that by and large has entered service with little clinical experience.

Graduating more nurses and providing them with a higher level of training, as outlined by the PBMC initiative, will help expand and improve clinical capacity, said Delahanty.

Pen Bay Healthcare is grateful to Sen. Susan Collins, whose office worked with the PBH development staff to secure the funding.

"Funding included in the Labor-HHS and Education spending bill will be used to continue critical health and education programs in Maine," said Collins. "These programs and projects maintain Maine's commitment to providing its children with a safe learning environment, its workers with quality training, and our sick and elderly with the care they deserve."