Royal Inland Hospital typically hires 50 to 70 new graduate nurses every year. For these new nurses, RIH is a dynamic and sometimes intense healthcare environment and can be challenging for a new graduate. Without proper support and training, the hospital risks losing new nurses to other types of nursing outside the hospital setting. Last year, concerned with support for new nurses, Meagan Hanson, Director of Health Services and Andrea Burrows, Staff Development Educator at RIH, developed a pilot mentorship program at RIH to help ensure newly graduated nurses made a successful transition into a nursing role at our hospital.

Launched in 2016, the Foundation contributed to the start-up costs associated with the project which included a two day workshop for the 10 nurse mentors who volunteered to participate in the project. The mentors were then matched with new nurse “mentees” and met with them on a monthly basis.  In June 2017, the pilot project team celebrated the successful completion of the program for their first intake of new nurses. The goal is to continue to offer the program on an ongoing basis and create a lasting culture of learning, support and leadership for nurses at RIH.