nurses

In areas overwhelmed by COVID cases, hospitals must rely on traveling nurses to operate ICUs. Hospitals pay a premium for that temporary help, while also struggling to keep their staff nurses happy.

A predicted nursing shortage is expected to effect The Villages especially hard. In nearby Ocala, the College of Central Florida is racing to help meet the demand.

Health care workers already bore the brunt of workplace violence in the U.S. Now, tensions from an exhausting pandemic are spilling over into hospitals.

For the minority of nursing students who have refused a COVID shot, the Biden administration's vaccine policy could mean they can’t get the training they need in a hospital or other health care venue.

Nursing shortages were already a problem, but the COVID-19 pandemic and population growth are making things worse.

From 2019 to 2020, assaults on hospital staff by patients tripled at Cox Medical Center in Branson, Mo. Now personal panic buttons are being implemented to alert hospital security more easily.

President Biden has ordered more than 17 million health care workers to get a COVID-19 vaccine. Some health care employers fear losing large numbers of workers who don't want the shots.

At the forefront of the concerns is a shortage of nurses, which the executives told lawmakers has created an emergency for hospital administrators.

About a quarter of U.S. health care workers have refused the COVID-19 vaccine as of July. They share demographic traits with other unvaccinated people and are putting hospitals in a tough spot.

Prior to the Biden administration annoucing national requirements for health workers, hospitals in this part of Florida have taken different approaches to mask and vaccine mandates.