STOCKHOLM, March 11 (Xinhua) -- The shortage in assistant nurses is at an all-time high in Sweden, a new report from the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions showed.
Swedish Television reported Saturday that the survey showed that 62 percent of Sweden's municipalities have difficulties recruiting health-care personnel, and particularly trained assistant nurses.
According to earlier forecasts, Sweden would need to recruit 10,000 assistant nurses annually in order to meet the nation's demand.
Nowadays, around 3,000 are trained in the profession every year at high schools that specialize in health-care and around half that number is trained within adult education institutions. That is not enough to meet the growing demand.
Moreover, many of those who do train to become assistant nurses only see it as a steppingstone to other, better-paid professions within the health-care sector, according to the survey.
"We are working hard to make the assistant nurse profession more attractive," said Caroline Olsson of the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions, which is an employers' organization that also represents and advocates for local government in Sweden.
Currently, there are around 180,000 assistant nurses in Sweden, the majority of whom work within municipality-run elderly care facilities.
The demand looks set to grow significantly in the near future, according to Olsson, who said trained staff are key to maintaining high quality in elderly care provision.
According to the Kommunal trade union, raising the wage levels is key to attracting more people to the assistant nurse profession.
"We have to raise the wages and we have to improve the work conditions, for instance by offering more people full-time work. We also have to raise the profession's status by introducing a certificate for assistant nurses," said Kommunal chairman Tobias Baudin.
