How a North Carolina health care program can fill gaps in S.C. hospitals

From nursing shortages to the lack of proper health care training, the medical field has been experiencing major challenges and crises, which are expected to continue in the near future.

Since the Covid-19 pandemic between 2020 to 2022, nurses in the United States have been leaving their roles en masse, with an additional 610,338 registered nurses planning to leave by 2027, according to the National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN).

Yet a new project by the University of North Carolina (UNC) may serve as a model – one that institutions in South Carolina, such as the Medical University of South Carolina, could explore to address similar workforce issues

Patient Sitter Program: Training future health care professionals

Developed by Dr. Meg Zomorodi, the program prepares pre-health students to assist in hospitals while accumulating real-world experience.

Zomorodi developed the program due to a personal trauma of losing her mother due to a medical error. This served as an impetus for her to make a change in a health care system that is clearly in crisis, and the associate provost for Interprofessional Health Initiatives at UNC has assisted Zomorodi in turning her wish for reform into a reality.

The program includes focusing on and observing the safety and well-being of patients. In various health care settings, patient sitters will receive training on:

Patient safety: Safety protocols are essential to ensuring the program succeeds.
Communication skills: Sessions will focus on how to overcome communication challenges and conflicts and how they might be encountered as sitters.
Crisis management and de-escalation techniques: How to handle patients who may feel anxious or disoriented, that maintains their and your safety.
Clinical skills: Any skills needed in the clinical setting.
Ethics and patient privacy: Students will need to know how to maintain constant monitoring while ensuring the dignity of the patient.

By gaining such hands-on training and experience, students gain valuable practical insight into the clinical environment, applying their theoretical knowledge to real-life practice and, ultimately, understanding patient interactions. A similar initiative could be piloted by hospitals in Charleston, where student engagement programs may ease the health care burden while providing valuable experience.

Addressing the nursing shortage

Let’s face it, the majority of nurses are burned out, with many citing long shifts, constant pressure and lack of support from leadership as the main contributing causes to this chronic stress and fatigue.

Naturally, the program plays a crucial role in relieving overburdened health and hospital staff by training students for lower-acuity patient care – those who have symptoms of an illness or injury with a low probability of exacerbating or intensifying in the future – and supervising those who cannot independently care for themselves, particularly older patients who have been experiencing cognitive decline.

Zomodrdi explains that “they’re going to see some things,” so while it is a high-pressure experience, it is still a rewarding one. With South Carolina, including regions like Charleston, facing similar nursing shortages, this model presents an opportunity for replication within the state’s health care system.

Moreover, the program offers student sitters a valuable opportunity as a stepping stone for those wanting to pursue careers in nursing or other health care professions.

A case study conducted in 2023 found that having students become student nurses in their placements was a key factor in raising clinic capacity and improving access for patients. Students not only valued their placement but also felt they were more “part of the team” than in other traditional placement models.

As such, the effect of this will most likely be even more profound with initiatives such as UNC’s patient-sitting program, as students can also have a sense of achievement and accomplishment in their support of nursing staff while enhancing patient outcomes through the direct care of patients.

Comprehensive training and safety protocols

As noted before, students are provided with critical training on safety protocols, including completing environmental surveys before each shift so they can check and remove anything that could cause bodily harm. This is precisely in line with fulfilling the goals of creating a culture of safety in nursing as per the American Nursing Association.

Students will receive CPR certification, crisis prevention training and phlebotomy skills (blood drawing), followed by 24-hour shadowing and weekly faculty-led debrief discussion sessions.

Michele Ream, a registered nurse and clinical nurse educator who helps teach the course, says that these training programs and safety protocols are just as much about keeping students safe as it is about keeping patients safe. And this could not be truer as it is only through safe health workers that we can have safe patients. The two are inextricably linked and co-dependent – two sides of the same coin.

Recent classifications have incorporated ineffective communication or lack of communication as a barrier to safe care and have been associated equally with errors, accidents and unsafe work behaviors. These debriefing and discussion sessions at UNC’s program serve as a platform for students to be open about the inevitable communication challenges (or any conflicts, in general) they may have encountered as a sitter, cultivating a process of improvement through collaborative learning.

Positive impact and future expansion

Currently, 41 students act as patient sitters, roles that nurses and certified nursing assistants originally filled, and 15 from the pilot program have secured hospital roles. These all help relieve some of the stress on current hospital nursing staff. When student patient-sitters handle non-medical patient supervision, other nurses and doctors can focus on more critical aspects of patient care, allowing improved efficiency and reducing the all-too-pervasive burnout among health care workers.

‘I would like to scale it up right now and offer this program beyond UNC,’ as Zomorodi said. There are currently plans for the program to roll out across UNC campuses, to which a significant number of students have also been applying. Hence, there is a growing potential for similar programs to be developed in other states such as South Carolina. After all, Zomodridi said she not only wishes the program to be widened, but also views that it should be expanded further across the country since it plays a crucial role in alleviating the pressures on certified nursing assistants.

Pathway to health care careers

Finally, for the students themselves, the program will play a major role in opening many pathways in the health care industry.

Communication and interpersonal skills, problem-solving skills, self-confidence, empathy and flexibility are listed as some of the top factors employers look for in health care job candidates, so students having constant exposure to the clinical environment can greatly give them a competitive edge over other candidates.

The program enhances students’ clinical performance and prepares them for advanced health care roles, including entry into MSN programs such as online ABSN programs and other types of medical degrees.

All in all, the shortage crisis will not disappear any time soon, but the model provided by UNC may be exactly what health care systems in South Carolina need to push through the challenges they currently face.