Bluewater Health is celebrating a pilot project that has successfully recruited about 20 graduating nurses this spring, double what they've been able to hire in previous years.
Director of Human Resources and Occupational Health Colleen Cook said discussions started with fourth-year nursing students in their final clinical placement at the beginning of this year.
"On their very first day of their placement, we met with them and did the welcoming to Bluewater Health and the orientation, and we wanted to have a little bit of a different angle than we had taken in previous years," said Cook. "We wanted to be proactive in going to them and looking at them for filling our positions."
She said staff worked very close with the students throughout January and February to understand where their interests were within the organization.
"We essentially advised them that when they were done with their placement, we would have work for them and we wanted them to be part of the Bluewater Health team."
While the hospital also accepts nursing students from Western University and the University of Windsor, the students in this hiring cohort are largely from Lambton College.
"We maintain great partnerships with them (Lambton College) to ensure that we're getting the resources that we need and they maintain great partnerships with us to make sure that their curriculum meets our needs," said Cook. "So, we're very happy with that partnership."
Vice President of Clinical Support Services and Chief Nursing Executive Shannon Landry said the pilot targeting new grads is one of many strategies to attract and retain employees.
"We've looked at the model of care, we've also looked at the model of support from the clinical educators within the building," said Landry. "We have changed that model to ensure that they are on the floor more, more accessible, more visible, for our employees who are working on the floors. So, there are many different things that we can do."
Landry said some of the graduating nurses will pursue temporary licenses to allow them to practice before writing their exam for registration with the College of Nurses of Ontario, while others will join the organization after completing the exam and full registration.
Landry said Bluewater Health currently has approximately 450 registered nurses (RN's) and 250 registered practical nurses (RPN's) and about 60 per cent are full-time.
"Some people love part-time, they get lieu benefits and they can be a little bit more flexible with their schedule, while others want full-time."
A supervised practical experience partnership was also recently approved at Bluewater Health to help internationally trained nurses gain experience and credentials to work in Ontario.
According to Bluewater Health, nurses are in such high demand province-wide they only received 248 applications for 117 RN job postings in 2021.
The hospital reports that upon entering the pandemic, Ontario was short by nearly 22,000 RN's compared to the rest of Canada.
