Does the difficulty with getting nursing jobs mean there is no point in young people doing nursing degrees?

[SqueakyC13an]

Just that really

What difficulty?

Err everywhere I know is painfully short of RN’s

Several threads saying there are no jobs for doctors or nurses to apply for after uni,they go to more experienced staff from abroad.

I don’t understand why these nurses aren’t being hired.

We know the NHS is understaffed.

I don't understand what's going on but I'm meeting lots of NQN who are struggling to find a job! Several are working as band 2 health care assistants.

I know but I’m not sure I want my daughter putting everything into getting on and completing a nursing degreee if there are no jobs after.

There are nursing jobs available all over the world. With a nursing degree she could get a job most places

She’d want a job in the uk.

That's not my experience at all.
I'm a HCA, and nurses are getting snapped up left, right and centre!
They can pretty much choose their terms, they're that much in demand.

I'm in Yorkshire.

There are currently 6822 nurse vacancies on NHS jobs, across all grades.

It depends really. NHS is definitely not recruiting as much. With NHSE being disbanded and reduction in workforce there by 50%, a lot of the clinical staff will either be redeployed locally or made redundant. They’ll be experienced so in a good position for being appointed and if redeployment then will be preferred candidates. It will make it a tough arena for NQN for a few years. It will eventually get better when the economy picks up. This has happened before.

I’m a midwife. Never heard of all lack of nursing positions in the UK. A quick google shows there is a shortage of 10,000 nurses in the UK.

There seems to be threads saying otherwise.

This is the first year I have known students graduate and not all of them have jobs to go to (south coast). It is baffling when you hear all the time about nurses being in short supply but it is very true down here.

I qualified in nursing 2011, moved around a lot, never been out of work or had difficulty finding a position both NHS and remotely. There are lots of other reasons I wouldn't go into it (poor working conditions, poor pay, stress, burnout, abuse from patients etc) but actually the job security is one of the good aspects about it and not something I would worry about. The cuts to staffing will be aimed at middle management positions rather than front line staff.

There are always nursing jobs somewhere, if not in a hospital then community or practice nursing. I absolutely don’t believe a nurse couldn’t find a job somewhere and I’ve been a nurse for over 20 years.

Is it that the jobs aren’t where the students are? Eg jobs going unfilled in an expensive area where no one can afford to live, whilst jobs in affordable areas are like hens teeth?

I work with student nurses and there are several who haven’t been offered jobs - BUT… it tends to be due to an odd sense of entitlement, I.e. insisting on a clinic or community role as a first post or only wanting to work 9-5 or having a role that fits in with school hours. When they find there’s nothing doing in that regard they then complain to all and sundry that there are no jobs. As with any other graduate job you need to show flexibility to fit the employers needs and then there are plenty of roles available.

I think you might need to consider that often the parents of particular young people assume there is a wider problem when actually the problem is specific to their own child. There are literally tens of thousands of nursing vacancies.

You are absolutely correct and I agree, I would be encouraging your child down a different career path.

Im a sister in the north west, I can confirm that the majority of students from the latest intake at the local university cannot find a paid job within the local nhs trusts. There are LOTS of vacancies across the NHS, however, due to the job freeze thanks to the financial position of local trusts, there is absolutely no funding to recruit nurses into the roles.

It’s sad and unbelievable, but very true!

There is a lack of nursing jobs being advertised at the moment! In the south west at least.

I’m currently a student mental health nurse and most placements I have state they don’t have the funding and are not replacing the staff that leave. The other issue is that a lot of band 5 posts have been down graded and filled with nursing associates and well being practitioners, or filled by international nurses, so not only do they not have the budget they don’t have the band 5 roles available.
This isn’t a criticism of those roles or international nurses, in my experience they are fantastic and needed.

I qualify soon and I don’t yet have a post lined up. I’m not panicking just yet but I am worried.

We have tons of nursing vacancies in London. All our students due to qualify have jobs

For context, my trust has 2 band 5 (newly qualified) posts advertised- bank work only which is effectively a zero hour contract. Approx 465 nurses will qualify from one nearby university alone in April.

How many NHSE staff worked clinically and would want to return to that though? Not many surely.

It's more or less not an option to live in London on a nurse' salary.