Mila, who has cerebral palsy, still required the care of a home nurse, as she recovered last fall from having a tracheotomy — a surgical opening in the throat to help her breath.
But there were no home nurses available. So, due to staffing shortages and cracks in the health care system — but not due to medical need — Mila had to stay in the hospital. It had been two weeks since she was well enough to go home. She’d arrived in the hospital close to two months ago, and her family and the hospital discharge planner had been searching for a home nurse the whole time.
Finding nurses to care for medically fragile children at home has historically been difficult. But since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the problem has worsened dramatically, according to parents of children with disabilities and home health agencies. The pandemic set off a surge in demand for nurses at hospitals, clinics and other health care facilities, and widened the compensation gap between these and lower-paid home nursing jobs. This pulled nurses away from home care. At the same time, large numbers of nurses left the profession — many due to health concerns, retirement and burnout — shrinking the overall workforce. As a result, fulfilling requests for home nurses has become close to impossible, those in the field said. That’s especially true for the more than 1 in 4 California children with special health care needs who, like Mila, are insured through the state’s public health insurance program, Medi-Cal, which typically pays nurses less than private insurance.