CHARLESTON, W.Va. — There appear to be some modest gains in the number of nurses working in West Virginia.
State lawmakers heard a report during legislative interim committee meetings Tuesday at the state capitol.
“We did see a small number increase, about 1.6 percent increase in the number of nurses who report working in West Virginia,” West Virginia Center of Nursing Administrator Jordyn Reed said. “So, while overall numbers of those licensed in the state has decreased a little bit, we have seen the number who are working in West Virginia modestly.”
One program that has provided many gains is the West Virginia Nursing Scholarship program that comes with a post-graduation service obligation. The program accounts for 75% of the annual budget for the West Virginia Center for Nursing and since 2006 more than $3.5 million has been allocated to scholarships, according to Reed.
“As of August of 2020, we did an analysis of that program and found 88.7-percent of service obligation completers still maintain an active West Virginia nursing license,” Reed said. “It’s one of the most successful programs that we have.”
Reed said about 230 middle and high school students are currently working toward a career in nursing in the Nursing Academy. There are 22 academies across the state that provide education, job shadowing, mentoring and practical exercises designed to get students interested in nursing careers.
According to West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission Senior Diretor of Financial Brian Weingart, once those students and others looking for a career in nursing graduate they have access to things like the Promise Scholarship, Invests Grant or the Higher Education Grant.
“In 2021-22 we had over 15,000 students receive the Higher Education Grant and over 66% t attend one of the four-year institutions in the state,” Weingart told lawmakers.
Another successful program was the Balance West Virginia program modeled after the WVU Outdoor Collaborative Ascend program. Balance was a national campaign offering incentives for nurses to relocate. The service obligation in the Balance program is tied directly to the relocation bonus.
“From May through September that we had funding for that project we brought in 102 nurses from out-of-state to move to West Virginia and pledge to work in West Virginia,” HEPC Vice Chancellor Health Sciences Cynthia Persily said.
During the upcoming regular session, Persily said they will change their funding model since lawmakers passed Senate Bill 518 which cut the budget of the West Virginia Center for Nursing by 75%. Persily said they will consider repealing the section of code that made the center a separate state agency and write new policy that would bring in under control of the HEPC.
“The center was previously funded since its inception in the early 2000s by a $10 fee that was paid by all registered nurses and licensed practical nurses at the time of renewal of their license,” Persily said.