Today, we live in a changing world and this change is bringing about a whole variety of new challenges. One of the biggest changes that are occurring today is the increasing population and changing demographic patterns. This change is going to have a major impact on healthcare facilities all over the globe. With life expectancies increasing, more and more resources will go towards caring for the elderly, treating chronic diseases and medical issues related to aging.

Not just this, but there have been massive demographic shifts as well which means that the world has become a global village. People from different backgrounds and heritage are living together in the same cities and this cultural diversity naturally means that medical facilities must be capable to deal with a large variety of issues, illnesses and diseases. This applies just as much to the profession of nursing.

A research recently showed that more than 80% people in the US over the age of 65 suffer from at least one chronic disease. Given such situation, the healthcare industry needs to gear up and the first and foremost focus should be on the services of the nurses.

Some important things to remember about elderly healthcare:

  1. The need to achieve across-the-board improvement in elderly healthcare across all settings
  2. How person-to-person services of the elderly individuals and nurses can lead to an improved experience for the former
  3. The ability of the nurses to be able to solve a host of problems that the elderly are likely to face
  4. Assessing the tools, processes and data regarding elderly healthcare to make processes more efficient

Naturally, nurses will play a very important role in healthcare in the future, and it is of vital importance that they be developed as a resource.

Moving on, the issue of increasing diversity must be addressed. As the world becomes a melting pot and people with varying culture backgrounds come together, the nurses in particular must be trained to treat such patients and must understand the intricacies of operating in such an environment.

Many a nurses’ associations’ focus on developing the diversity-tolerance of nurses as well as their skill set that will allow them to understand the situation better.

Diversity can be based on a number of things:

  1. Place of birth
  2. Religion
  3. Ethnicity
  4. Income level
  5. Lifestyle

Naturally, nurses who are insensitive to cultural diversity or do not have the right skill set will lead to unhappy patients which will lead to lower moral and thus lower efficiency of the healthcare system.

In the world we are living today, it is no easy task to embrace diversity, let alone train our nurses to provide services that cater to the diverse needs. However, this is the need of the time and there is no other way to go about it. This is the direction that healthcare must take and without it, we could potentially be facing inefficient healthcare for a long time to come. The truth is that the success of healthcare reforms will depend upon how well the nurses are able to do their job and whether they are equipped with the appropriate tool sets to take on a diverse set of patients.

Keeping all this in mind, an online RN to BSN degree is one of the most important steps towards a more positive future for healthcare. Campbellsville University has a strong reputation for imparting quality knowledge and its world class faculty truly makes this degree worth it. With this program, the nurses of tomorrow will get to understand and provide solutions for a changing world.