Is Healthcare Right for You?

Welcome to the Heart of Health and Science. I'm Regenia Stull, Chief Nursing Officer at Liberty Hospital. Today, we're discussing one question: Is healthcare right for you? I have the pleasure of talking about my journey through healthcare and introducing you to people who know how to get into healthcare and succeed once you've entered the field.

REGENIA: Now, this is something that I did not struggle with as a teenager. Early on, I knew I wanted to go into healthcare, specifically nursing. When I was in high school, I went to a CNA program, and the very first thing we could do in that program was to become candy stripers in the local hospital. We wore the little pink and white striped bib overall dress outfit. We loved it so much. We felt like we had arrived. I want to introduce you to a few people who can help you get into healthcare and make the most of it once you arrive.

JAMIE: My name is Jamie Young. I'm the Talent Sourcing Strategist at Liberty Hospital. In my role, I get to do a little bit of everything. At the heart of that, I'm a recruiter, but also, I get to strategize and partner with many of the subject matter experts at the hospital. I get to work with a variety of people. I recruit for a graduate nursing program, work with our business partners on hard-to-fill roles and work closely with Jacklyn on talent pipeline and education strategies.

JACKLYN: I'm Jacklyn Gentry. I'm the Senior Director for Professional Practice at Liberty Hospital. In my role, I get to do a lot of work with the community, from high schools through colleges and universities, increasing access to healthcare and education, how to get people interested in healthcare, and hopefully, how to bring them into the hospital setting with us. I also focus a lot on recruitment and retention initiatives in general and working with our leaders.

REGENIA: Jamie, I have a question for you: You said your job is as a talent sourcing strategist at Liberty Hospital. Could you tell us what that means?

JAMIE: I partner with many different folks to help bring in talent and drive application flow across the hospital. People send me their resumes on our website and say, "Hey, look, I'm really interested in healthcare. Is there a place for me?" I get to have a lot of those really general conversations, and they're just really exciting. I love workforce and pipeline development, and I get to promote the student programs we've initiated in the last two years.

REGENIA: It's so exciting. I grew up in a church setting, and my dad always said that if you don't have young people and young families in a church, the church will not survive. That can be equated to every business and profession out there. If we don't have new people in healthcare looking at healthcare and wanting to do that, healthcare will not survive. And that's one of the primary things that you have the opportunity to do.

JAMIE: Where do I start? We host and do things in recruitment like Walk-in Wednesdays. We get to sit down and talk with folks, saying, “I want to be here. I want to be in healthcare, but I just don't quite know where I fit.” I started as a CNA during my senior year of high school. I had the opportunity to attend a local technical school and completed a one-year program in medical terminology to become a CNA. That was around 20 years ago. It was really exciting because I got to do clinicals in long-term care facilities with a geriatric population. Back then, it was difficult for a CAN to get into the acute care setting, but I was able to get in as a student. It was the cardiovascular thoracic unit, and I was learning to take care of patients who literally had a tube coming out of every orifice of their body. I worked the floor as a tech, and I remember my very first day in that role. I had a fantastic preceptor.

She said, "You can't quit, and you can't cry." And I was like, "Okay, okay, I got this," and I saddled up for a 12-hour shift. I worked the day shift, tied my tennis shoes tight and carried a pager. It was a 48-bed unit, I would be answering call lights and taking care of patients. The unit was busy, and we worked with cardiac patients who needed to get up for their meals and be walked three times a day. Like I said, I've been in healthcare a long time, but I'm non-clinical. But I still look back 20 years later, and I still pull from my experiences on the on that floor because it taught me so much. I learned how to communicate with the care team. I learned how to communicate with a patient and their family members. I got to work alongside amazing nurses that wanted to share their experiences and share their insight. And why do we do the things that we do. And so, I just got that first job and really never looked back.

REGENIA: Yeah. Once you get into healthcare, it becomes so much part of your identity and core. Even if you're not doing the clinical like you just described, you're still very attached to it, and you're still very instrumental in its success. Which brings me to you, Jacklyn. Often, you get phone calls from people outside of healthcare, and they ask what they need to do to get started. How do you field those calls, and what do you tell them? And do they only ask you about nursing, or are there other areas you're also asked about?

JACKLYN: It depends on what they're looking for, such as a clinical pathway into nursing or something else in healthcare. So often, I start those conversations by asking them about themselves: What are your goals? What is your life like? Because if they have five children and are a single parent, that journey is going to look very different for them. So, trying to understand where they are and then, like Jamie said, starting out as a patient care tech is one of the best ways to get into the clinical side of healthcare because it allows you to experience what it's like to communicate with patients and the rest of the healthcare team. From there, we look for the best financial path toward attending school. What is the quickest pathway to go to school?

So, we look at prerequisites, nursing school, and all those things. I usually talk to them about all the options, from being an LPN to an RN, an associate degree program versus bachelor's degree programs. I also get those questions on the non-clinical side, and we have really strong partnerships with schools that offer all kinds of degree programs. Business, accounting, and finance are popular. We help our employees identify those programs and connect them with the right people to get the answers to create a pathway for them to help them succeed in healthcare in a non-clinical role.

REGENIA: I love that you include finance in that. Healthcare finance is so unique.  It's not the same as working in the stock market or a bank. It's completely different. The language is different. Even the things that we measure are different. And so, if people have an acumen towards numbers but still have a bit of a heart toward, or an experience with healthcare that they would like to combine, that's a perfect opportunity to do that. So, for both of you, day to day in your work life, what kind of things fill your cup? What brings you joy? What makes you want to come back day after day after day and do it again?

JAMIE: We offer excellent early career opportunities, such as becoming a patient safety attendant or working in environmental services and dietary. We have to have those folks to run a hospital. We have to be able to feed our community and our patients. We have to have sanitation. If they can get a feel for that environment and really understand how a hospital works, they see jobs they may have yet to be aware of. What fills my cup is seeing folks reach their potential. I have been able to recruit for our graduate nursing program. I've been doing that for quite some time. I love talking with students. Students will give you the best feedback. I talk with them about what got them into nursing and why they're interested in Liberty.  I ask where they want to be, where their capstone was, and where their clinicals are? And they say Liberty time and time again.

They say, "I did my clinical there, and the nurses made me feel welcome. They pulled me in for things I've never seen before. They never made me feel like a burden," and I love that. It gives me goosebumps a little bit. That makes me very proud to be a recruiter at Liberty Hospital, and I truly believe we do amazing things at Liberty. Is it perfect? No. Is there work to do? Sure. But when I hear those types of things, that's awesome. I like to have conversations and get folks excited. I'm a first-generation college student so I love this stair step. It’s exciting to create opportunities to help people build their potential.

REGENIA: One of the really cool things is hearing why people want to go to healthcare and how excited they are about it every day. Once you have those conversations, I imagine you sometimes punt to Jacklyn for the details and how to get from point A to point B. So, Jacklyn, what are some of your favorite conversations, and what types of conversations fill your cup on a daily basis?

JACKLYN: Some of my favorite things are what Jamie said about helping people reach their full potential. When someone says they have no experience but want to be a nurse, we can put them into a patient safety attendant position, help them through our PCT class internally, and help them find a pathway into nursing. When they become nurses, it is so exciting, and they want to stay with us because they love Liberty. We have been able to help and support them and grow them into great healthcare providers. Those are the things that fill my cup.

REGENIA: Mine, too, just hearing the stories through you. We have a lot in healthcare. Something is always looming out there. We just came through the pandemic, and we wonder what's next. One of the things that I learned through you, Jacklyn, primarily, is that because of the pandemic, at first, there was this surge of people wanting to go into healthcare, and then that changed. Can you talk a bit about the concern you see for healthcare and how we can address it?

JACKLYN: As you said, during COVID, a huge surge of people wanted to enter healthcare. But over the last couple of years, it's backed off a little bit. People not wanting to go to college or go into healthcare, and also people who did their last year or two of high school online, are less successful as quickly in college as we've traditionally experienced. One of the problems we are seeing right now is decreased graduate numbers from colleges and universities, which translates to fewer nurses. On the other hand, the positive thing we are starting to see nationwide and in the Kansas City metro area is that applicants for nursing programs are on the rise again. So, within the next couple of years, we will hopefully have a greater influx into nursing.

I think that we will still face a nursing shortage, so we should always think ahead 5 to 10 years. What does that look like, and what can we do now to prepare for that, knowing that it takes four years to become a nurse. How can we be proactive? And that's where many of our programs, like Jamie mentioned, help support people through school and bring them into healthcare, starting with high school students. How can we excite them about healthcare? How can we expose them to what it's like and show them all the cool things we get to do every day?

JAMIE: We were able to host Medical Careers Day, and that was really cool. We brought in high school students interested in healthcare to show them and raise awareness about whether they want to go into radiology or respiratory therapy. It was phenomenal because people don't understand how important something like a biomed tech is. If a caregiver or clinician attempts to use a piece of equipment to care for a patient and it doesn't work, that's a problem. It could be with X-rays, IT or even the equipment itself. It can be challenging for the clinician if we don't know how to troubleshoot these issues. So, I think you still have a part in patient care in those roles, right? It helps to connect the dots.

REGENIA: You've talked a lot about high school students coming in, but what about people now looking at healthcare as a second career? Have you had much exposure to that? Have you had many conversations around that?

JACKLYN: Yes, several of our schools in the area offer accelerated nursing programs. Those programs are for anyone who has a bachelor's degree in something else. You can get a bachelor's degree in nursing in a year. Nursing school in 12 months is really tough, really a challenge. However, that is a great option for somebody who has a degree and knows they want to get into healthcare. Many already work as a tech because they know they want to be in healthcare. They've already experienced college life. They're adults. They have a pathway at this point. They are driven, know exactly what they want, and are ready to go to school and come to work.

REGENIA: That's perfect. Do you guys have a magic ball you can look into and say this person would be great for healthcare? Or when they tell you, I really want to go into healthcare, but the sight of blood makes me pass out cold. Do you have any signs of who would be an excellent fit? Or if a different part of healthcare would be more appropriate for them. What are some of those signs, and how do you direct people?

JAMIE: Yeah, it's just sitting down and having a conversation. Like Jacklyn mentioned before, what is your schedule like? What's your commitment like? What can you commit to? We can do a great job of training folks on many things in healthcare. But at the end of the day, you have to care about people. We can't teach you empathy or to care about others. But my philosophy is that if you have a heart for people, you have a place in healthcare. And we have to figure that out. The landscape of healthcare, and what has kept me in it for so long now, is that the landscape is constantly changing. So, you have to be ready to roll with the changes that come with healthcare. But that's an exciting piece of it as well.

REGENIA: I would agree completely. So, I want to throw a curve at you. Jamie has had some amazing experiences within nursing. I know you're working with professional development and the continued growth of those in healthcare and nursing. I know that you work a lot with that, but could you talk a little bit about the art of nursing and the compassion of nursing and the things that are required there and how those expand to those who work in ultrasonography or those who work in the lab or in other areas of healthcare, that aren't specific to nursing.

JACKLYN: Yes. So, in nursing, we talk about the art and the science of nursing. And so, the art is the caring, the compassion, the empathy, and all the things Jamie mentioned that are inherent to a person, and we can't teach you those things. The science. On the other hand, I can teach you anatomy and physiology and how to perform a skill. Looking at healthcare providers, whether clinical at the bedside or non-clinical in finance, you have to have that heart for people no matter what you're doing. In healthcare, we see people on their very best days and very, very worst days. And even if you're in finance, you may still talk to them as they are experiencing the repercussions of their very, very worst days. You have to have heart, compassion and empathy for helping others, whether over the phone, in person, or sitting at their bedside in any setting within healthcare.

REGENIA: Yeah, another setting in healthcare is education. Before I met you, you were in education. Can you talk about your education experience? What type of students do you meet, and what do you look for in a student? What qualities would a student bring that would make them absolutely perfect for an acute care setting or another field of healthcare?

JACKLYN: I've been in education for more than 12 years, teaching students at the bachelor's degree and master's levels, all on the nursing side. And when you're looking at applicants to a nursing program, well, of course, you want students who are academically successful because nursing school is a challenge. You also really look for students who can communicate well, work well in a team, and be willing to go the extra mile to help someone without even being asked. Those are some of the qualities that you can just pick up when you talk to someone and know, okay, this person's going to be a good fit for healthcare.

Once we give you all the science and background you need to succeed in that area, all of that translates into what I do now because of all the work that we see with high school students getting to interact through Medical Careers Day, our high school internships, through our CNA program, and then guiding those who have heart and desire into nursing programs or other clinically related programs to become healthcare providers down the road.

REGENIA: So, if you go into nursing, are you locked in that for the rest of your professional life? If not, what can be done about that?

JACKLYN: So that's the great thing about nursing; there is something for everyone. You could go into 100 different fields. I'm a good example. I started as a CAN, as a bedside nurse. However, even in college, I knew I wanted to pursue education. I haven't been a bedside nurse in over 12 years. However, I am still very much intimately involved with nursing, patient outcomes, and making a difference in the lives that touch our patients. Whether you want to be a leader, an educator, a nursing informaticist, or a consultant, there are a hundred different ways you can still be in nursing or healthcare, and to me, that's what's really important and fulfilling.

REGENIA: You guys get to do such great things every single day. I want to ask each of you one final question: What is your absolute favorite story about your experience in healthcare that you can share with us?

JAMIE: One of my favorite stories happened three weeks ago. And, like I said earlier, as a recruiter, we're in uncharted territory right now. We're doing things that we've never done before. We started Walk-in Wednesdays. We had a candidate come in, and she interviewed. We brought her on as a patient safety attendant with no healthcare experience. She observed on the acute care side, in our inpatient units, and quickly wanted to do more. She went through our internal CNA program. She wanted to speak at her high school about Liberty Hospital and working here, and the PCT program. She did such a fantastic job. Now, she wants to go to nursing school, and she's starting in the fall. That is just huge. I called Jacklyn. I was teary-eyed all the way home because you do these things every day, and then you're like, "Wow, that is huge. That's really cool to experience that as a recruiter."

JACKLYN: The biggest thing for me is hearing from students and people I taught or helped, hearing about the great things they're doing as nurses. So, I had been teaching; it was my very first year as a faculty member, and it was at a small school. Our students stayed in touch with us after graduation, and it was less than six months after graduation when I received a phone call from one of my students. She was so excited and couldn't contain her happiness. She told me, "You're never going to believe what happened. I won a Daisy Award!" This award, which you know, is for extraordinary nursing care. Seeing a nurse who had only been working for six months win such a prestigious award was amazing. She was incredibly proud of herself and enthusiastic about nursing in general. Her success really stuck with me because it reflected the education and support we provide. It’s always such a positive feeling when you hear all the great things that your students get to do.

REGENIA: The amazing things you have shared today showcase your impact on the lives of the patients you serve. Not only do you help them, but in your roles, you also impact the lives of healthcare providers. You will forever be remembered for your contributions to their successful careers. And that's huge. You have impacted an entire life and possibly generations to come. Thank you so much for joining me today and for the work that you do. It's remarkable work, and you both should be commended for that. I can't even begin to express how appreciative I am of your work.

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