CNA Job Outlook - Alabama Nursing Schools and Nursing Programs

Nursing Aide Job Outlook

Employment of nursing, psychiatric, and home health aides is projected to grow much faster than the average for all occupations through the year 2014, although individual occupational growth rates will vary. Numerous job openings for nursing, psychiatric, and home health aides will arise from a combination of fast employment growth and high replacement needs. High replacement needs in this large occupation reflect modest entry requirements, low pay, high physical and emotional demands, and lack of opportunities for advancement. For these same reasons, many people are unwilling to perform the kind of work required by the occupation and therefore, persons who are interested in and suited for this work should have excellent job opportunities.

Many nursing aides leave the occupation to attend training programs for other health care occupations and consumer preference for care in the home as well as improvements in medical technologies for in-home treatment will contribute to faster than average employment growth for home health aides. Employment of home health aides is expected to grow the fastest, as a result of both growing demand for home healthcare services from an aging population and efforts to contain healthcare costs by moving patients out of hospitals and nursing care facilities as quickly as possible.

Nursing aide employment will not grow as fast as home health aide employment because nursing aides are concentrated in slower growing nursing care facilities however, employment of nursing aides is expected to grow faster than the average for all occupations through 2014 in response to an increasing emphasis on rehabilitation and the long-term care needs of an increasing elderly population. Modern medical technology will also increase the employment of nursing aides, because, as the technology saves and extends more lives, it increases the need for long-term care provided by nursing aides. Financial pressures on hospitals to discharge patients as soon as possible should produce more admissions to nursing care facilities.

The number of jobs for psychiatric aides in hospitals, where most of those in the occupation work, will grow slower than the average due to attempts to contain costs by limiting inpatient psychiatric treatment. Employment of psychiatric aides, the smallest of the three occupations, is expected to grow about as fast as the average for all occupations.

Most psychiatric aide jobs will be in residential mental health facilities and in home health care agencies. Employment in other sectors will rise in response to growth in the number of older persons, many of whom will require mental health services, increasing public acceptance of formal treatment for substance abuse, and a lessening of the stigma attached to those receiving mental health care. Job growth also could be affected by changes in government funding of programs for the mentally ill.