Weighing compensationAORN's 2008 Salary Survey shows trends in compensation for perioperative professionals
By Carina Stanton
Senior News Editor
As an economic downturn weighs on the minds of many, perioperative nurses can find the latest stats on the perioperative marketplace through results from AORN's 2008 Salary Survey.
Perioperative nurses working in ambulatory settings have
higher job satisfaction, despite lower compensation, according
to AORN's 2008 Salary Survey. These nurses participate in
education at the Outpatient Surgery Center at the University
Health Sciences Center in Aurora, Colo.
This year survey results show perioperative staff nurses averaging a 3.9% increase in annual compensation over the past five years. With the inflation rate averaging around 3.5% for the same period, that means perioperative nurse compensation is rising at a rate just slightly higher than inflation, explained Don Bacon, PhD, professor of marketing at the University of Denver's Daniels College of Business and a research associate at Rocky Mountain Market Research in Denver.
"Nursing salary is probably getting better, but only slightly," he added.
Bacon has helped create AORN's Salary Survey and publish the survey analyses for the past five years, since the survey was first established in 2003. This comprehensive annual survey provides a broad scan of trends in compensation, job satisfaction, benefits, and the nursing shortage based on responses from an average of 4,000 perioperative managers, directors and staff nurses for each year's survey.
Compensation and the shortage
Bacon also noted that this slight compensation increase for perioperative nurses over the past five years is consistent with the slight decrease in vacant full time employee perioperative nursing positions reported in the 2008 survey and past surveys, "so compensation and the nursing shortage may be related."
Despite survey results indicating an increase in staffing levels, 66% of staff nurses who responded to the survey said the current nursing shortage is at moderate to crisis level-down from 72% in the 2007 AORN Salary Survey. Also, 46% of top-level managers reported a moderate to crisis level of impact that the shortage has on their working environment, compared to 51% last year.
Bacon was not surprised by these numbers or with staff nurse respondents who reported being "least satisfied"with the number of support staff and management support at their facilities
"As expected, the shortage's impact on patient care tends to be rated more severely by those with the most patient contact," he said.
Comparing work environments
Because many AORN members work in ambulatory surgery centers, the 2008 survey included several ambulatory-focused questions regarding compensation, benefits, training and job satisfaction.
Based on survey results, it appears that nurses working in ambulatory surgery centers have higher job satisfaction, despite compensation lower than nurses working in acute care hospitals.
"I see this trend in my free-standing ASC, although with the present economy crunch, there are concerns over the lower pay scales," said Kate Moses, RN, CNOR, CPHQ, a perioperative nurse who works at an ambulatory surgery center in Miami. She attributes job satisfaction among nurses at her facility to more constant and flexible hours with no call and little overtime in most cases.
The flexible hours offered to nurses at North Texas Surgery Center in Dallas are also considered an important benefit to make up for the lower compensation her staff receive, according to Melodie Heatherly, RN, CNOR, CASC, the facility's director of nursing. "The pay scale I can provide staff is lower than acute care hospitals because my reimbursement per case is lower and, to keep my costs down and remain competitive, I have to keep my pay down."
For the first time, the survey also asked about hospital ownership and found that private hospitals compensated their staff at lower levels, when compared to public hospitals.
A broad look at benefits
While almost all survey respondents receive benefits as part of their compensation, the most frequently received benefit is health insurance, followed by dental insurance, earned time or PTO and life insurance. These benefits continue to rank among the most popular in each of AORN's salary surveys, according to Bacon.
Retirement benefits are causing the most concern for those surveyed, according to respondents' comments. Bacon's comparative analysis of retirement benefits shed light on these concerns because he finds a growing decrease in the percentage of nurses receiving a pension plan and a growing increase in these nurses receiving 401Kcontributions.
"This move toward 401Ks and away from long-term retirement benefits is a trend we see in the broader market place with larger companies because it can be seen as a huge financial liability. For example, part of General Motors' current financial problem is due to pension liabilities," Bacon said.
With economic concerns, companies looking for ways to cut budgets may consider reducing or temporarily cancelling 401K contributions, Bacon warned.
He also suggested that a new presidential administration and a looming recession could change compensation for nurses in the coming years. Next year he hopes to look at the possible implications of these changes through AORN's 2009 Salary Survey.
Read Bacon's full analysis of the 2008 AORN Salary Survey in the December issue of the AORN Journal.
How do you rank?
To see how these 2008 Salary Survey results impact you, visit AORN's online Salary Calculator found in AORN's CareerCenter.
AORN offers the Salary Calculator each year as a convenient way for healthcare professionals and recruiters to apply the salary survey data to their unique information needs.
AORN thanks Brigham and Women's Hospital, exclusive sponsor of the 2008 Salary Survey and online AORN Salary Calculator.
Read more news in AORN Connections.