Workforce

Nurses at five University of California hospitals plan to strike this Thursday, joining 12,000 Minnesota nurses from the same union in what would be the largest nursing strike in history, according to a report by the San Francisco Gate.

The Minnesota Nurses Association and 14 Minneapolis/St. Paul-area hospitals were unable to reach an agreement on contract negotiations last week, and talks between the groups have ceased, causing the nurses to move forward with plans for a one-day strike this…

The healthcare sector added 8,000 jobs in May for total seasonally adjusted employment of 13.73 million, but some areas saw slight declines during the month, according to data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The Minnesota Board of Nursing has been "flooded" with license applications from out-of-state nurses as 14 hospitals in the Twin Cities prepare for a nurses strike scheduled for June 10, according to a report in the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune.

While Florida gained more than 27,000 RNs in the past two years, losses to the nurse workforce erased 60 percent of that gain, according to a report by the Jacksonville Business Journal.

Chronic shortages of specialists are hampering efforts to staff hospital service lines such as cardiovascular services, neurosciences and orthopedics, according to a survey by Pinnacle Health Group, a physician recruiting firm based in Atlanta.

The healthcare industry saw the addition of 20,100 jobs in April 2010, according to a news release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Of 77 counties in Oklahoma, 59 do not meet the national standard of one primary care physician for every 3,500 residents, according to a report from News9.com. This puts Oklahoma dead last in the nation.

Chicago's Swedish Covenant Hospital has awarded employees a total of $1.5 million in retroactive raises now that it is making an operating profit, according to a report by the Chicago Sun-Times.

Hospital employment increased 0.04 percent to nearly 4.706 million, with seasonal adjustment, during March, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.