The goal of a Nursing Retention Toolkit released today (Mon) is to improve the working lives of nurses across the country.

Canada’s Chief Nursing Officer, Dr. Leigh Chapman, says it was created by nurses and for nurses, looking at what works and what doesn’t work in various settings across the country. She believes nurses need the support now more than ever noting that there are increasing stresses for nurses including an unreasonably high workload, moral distress and violence.
Chapman states that nurses are struggling with their mental health, experiencing burnout, distress and feeling overworked and unappreciated, causing them to leave their jobs. This toolkit is a resource created by nurses for nursing leadership and health system administrators.

Canada’s Health Minister, Mark Holland points out that nurses carried us through the pandemic, along with other health care professionals, and now, he says, it’s time to make things better. “Retention is everything, because we can do all of these things to bring new people in, but if this isn’t a profession that people are loving and are joyful in, if we are not doing the work to make sure people are staying, you can’t fill a bucket that’s got a hole in it.”

Some of the core themes of the toolkit are a balanced work life, mental health and wellness supports, reduced administrative burden and safe staffing practices. Nurses constitute Canada’s largest group of regulated health professionals with more than 450,000 members.

Click here for the toolkit.