New London ― Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, a shortage of nurses loomed on U.S. hospitals’ horizon.

The shortage was especially acute among perioperative nurses, whose specialty is caring for patients in the operating room before, during and after surgery.

Burnout, a lack of nursing education programs designed to prepare students for the specialty and retirements limited the supply of perioperative nurses at the same time Baby Boomers were demanding more and more surgeries.

Nothing’s changed much in the past few years.

In 2023, the AORN Journal, “The Official Voice of Perioperative Nursing,” highlighted a 2022 survey of 2,557 perioperative nurses that found that 18% of the full-time positions in their ranks were vacant, up from 11% in 2021. A third of the respondents indicated they were at least somewhat likely to leave their job in the next year.

Against that backdrop, Lawrence + Memorial Hospital this year introduced a paid summer internship program for student nurses interested in perioperative nursing.

The eight-week pilot program, which concluded Friday, appears to have hit the mark: All three Three Rivers Community College students who completed the hands-on training and a week’s orientation say they’re at least considering pursuing perioperative nursing.

“It can be a pipeline for us,” Lynne Killoy, director of perioperative services for L+M and Westerly hospitals and the Pequot Health Center in Groton, said of the program.

Killoy recalled participating in a similar internship program some 25 years ago, a time, she said, when it was hard for nurses to land jobs in the operating room.

“It’s definitely a different type of nursing,” she said. “You’re the eyes and ears of the patient. It’s pretty technical, too. You’re working with surgeons, equipment, surgical techs, very much part of a team.”

L+M’s internship program paired students with preceptors, or instructors, who guided them through such activities as monitoring a patient’s condition during and after surgery; maintaining sterile environments; sterile gowning and gloving; passing instruments and supplies to the surgeon; positioning patients for surgery; and observing surgical procedures.

A perioperative nurse needs to have a strong personality, good communication skills and an affinity for a fast pace, Killoy said. She must be an advocate for patients, adept at allaying their fears about what awaits them once the anesthesia takes effect.

It’s not for everyone, Killoy said.

At L+M, which performs 25 to 30 surgeries a day, one perioperative nurse is assigned to each of the hospital’s half-dozen operating rooms.

“You are that one nurse for the day, one nurse per one patient at a time,” Shannon Christian, L+M’s chief nursing officer, said.

Perioperative nurses handle two to six surgeries a day, depending on the complexity of the day’s scheduled procedures. A given surgery can last up to eight hours. Of L+M’s more than 700 nurses, 12 to 15 are perioperative nurses, according to Christian.

Recruiting and retaining perioperative nurses is more challenging than it used to be. Students with a general interest in nursing often don’t get much exposure to the specialty and some are put off by its demands. Once hired, perioperative nurses face six months of additional training and on-call duty.

“For years, we had nurses waiting for operating-room openings,” Christian said. “Today, many want greater work-life balance.”

On relatively short notice, Dawn Hydes, a nursing professional development specialist, put together L+M’s perioperative student nurse intern program. In recruiting candidates at Three Rivers, she looked for strong students with an interest in the perioperative environment and a desire to be part of a team. The application process required a 500-word essay.

“Years ago, perioperative nurses wouldn’t have come directly from college, but now that’s changed,” Hydes said.

Michelle Wollock, of East Lyme, one of the L+M program’s student nurse interns, expects to graduate from Three Rivers in December and already is working as a patient care assistant. She said the internship cemented her interest in perioperative nursing.

“You have to be mind readers,” she said of nurses in operating rooms. “You have to stay one step ahead of everyone else in the room. You have to know what they want even before they ask for it.”

Macy Flores, of Norwich, is heading into her third semester at Three Rivers. She responded when Hydes came to the school to conduct a job fair. She, too, is sold on the operating-room environment and expects to apply for a perioperative nursing job in January.

“I like the teamwork, the sense it’s a well-oiled machine,” she said of the operating room. “You’re the first person the patient sees and the last person the patient sees (before surgery).”

The third student in the L+M program, Tara Billups, of Norwich, is thinking about expanding her options but isn’t permanently ruling out perioperative nursing.

“I want more knowledge, so I might do something else before the operating room,” she said.

On the eve of the internship program’s penultimate day, Hydes pronounced the program a success, expressing the hope it can be expanded next year.

“We huddle at 6:30 a.m.,” she said.

b.hallenbeck@theday.com