Nursing Retention

There is a perpetual challenge of nurse retention in rural areas in many countries and has major consequences on the accessibility of health services in rural areas. The focus of the study will be in central Alberta. The purpose of this research is to identify the factors that affect nurse retention and how the organizational culture and academic preparation affect nurse retention in rural areas. Additionally, this exploration will be key in identifying strategies that may be utilized in dealing with the nurse retention. Mixed methodology will be utilized in this research including the following steps: a qualitative method comprising of initial set of interviews, followed by a survey from a larger sample of registered nurses who graduated within the last 2 years. The questions in the survey will be informed by the responses from the initial interviews. Literature review on rural nursing retention and recruitment challenge will be done on studies that have been done on this subject matter in other jurisdictions within rural and urban Canada. Gaps will be identified in the studies that have been done. Findings from the study will be shared with AHS for consideration and will inform the need for future studies in this subject area.
Keywords: retention and recruitment, organizational factors, academic factors, qualitative themes, qualitative data, mixed methodology