FISHERS — As rural hospitals across Indiana struggle to stay open and the health care industry braces for a projected shortage of 100,000 workers by 2028, local students are serving up hope.
Indiana Governor Mike Braun warned that the future of health care in Indiana is in trouble.
“We’ve got 80 to 90 rural hospitals hanging on by their fingernails,” Braun said. “You got five to seven very rich systems, and if you run like an unregulated utility, something’s gonna have to be done to make sure we have good care.”
Staffing remains one of the biggest concerns.
According to the American Hospital Association, the nationwide shortfall in health care workers will continue to grow unless changes are made.
“We do have some vacancies,” said Kimberly Nealon, chief nursing officer. "But, you know, it’s health care. People my generation, we get a job and we stay forever, right? Kids seem to have it more together than we did — they are choosing career paths and jobs that really meet their own personal needs," she added.
That trend is visible in Fishers, where twenty teens are participating in H-Camp — a week-long health care camp giving teens a hands-on look at the healthcare field.
“This entire week it’s allowed us to understand different aspects of medicine,” said Priya Singh, a senior at Hamilton Southeastern and one of the students selected for H-Camp.
“We’ve seen a lot of different things, not only just like hands-on experiences, like the Stop the Bleed, or just other things, but also listening to presentations from so many different fields of medicine,” added Royals Senior Addison Richmond.
For Richmond, the experience helped narrow her focus.
“Two things that I kind of came in were like physical therapy or occupational therapy, and after speaking with the PA, that’s probably like my main choice now,” she said.
Others, like Singh, discovered new possibilities.
“After hearing through a few physicians giving their speeches and just seeing their hands-on experience, I really consider doing internal medicine now because I think I would love that field,” she said.
While their paths may vary, the students share a common goal: to help others.
“I would just feel like a fulfillment in my life to be able to help someone through their hardships,” Singh said. “And I think that will be a blessing for me in the long term.”
“Just hearing how passionate these people are here with their jobs, it’s just been really eye-opening to see that too,” Richmond added.
Nealon said the students have impressed her.
“They have all the right answers,” she said. “Like I said, if I could hire them next week, I would.”
