Patients and medical staff are going to be seriously effected by the healthcare overhaul. Nearly 30 million newly insured people will want to go to the doctor or hospital for check ups and care, while physicians will be stretched beyond their means on how to handle this sudden influx. That is when nurses come in. An increase in nursing staff will make this new wave of patients swimmable, a very positive prospect for a nursing industry that has been painfully understaffed.

Nurse practitioners will be called upon to perform some of the tasks done by doctors if this projected influx does in fact take place. According to the New York Times, “Nurse practitioners are registered nurses who typically have a master’s degree in nursing. Numbering roughly 125,000 nationwide, more than three-quarters of them train in primary care, making them the largest group of non-physician primary care providers, according to a study by the American College of Physicians. (Physician assistants, another type of non-physician provider, generally work for specialists rather than in primary care.)”

With the necessity and importance of nurses now established, the government’s health care bill contains provisions to increase funding for nurse training programs, including nurse practitioner programs. Federal funding for nurse education has always been a knotty area for nurses. Doctor’s training, with residency nearly fully funded by Medicare, upsets nurses whose education is self-financed. Education for nurses received $300 million in federal funding in 2006, half of that amount restricted to hospital diploma programs (yielding only 5% of the nurses working today).

The new bill would provide $50 million every year from 2012-15 for Medicare demonstration programs for nurse education. Also, the House health reform bill of last week would authorize over $600 million in additional funding to support nurse training from 2011-15.

This is a historic move that will help doctors care for more patients more effectively, help patients get the best care and attention that they can get, and nurses to have the funding to get their degrees so they can practice their passion of helping while having a manageable number of patients to work with. If you’re interested in getting a nursing degree, the government is backing you up to go for it. All you have to do is try. Check out a program available to you today.