Saint Vincent, Assumption partner to train nursing students at hospital

Assumption University and Saint Vincent Hospital are partnering for a program to give 15 students hands-on clinical experience and provide the hospital with a pipeline of prospective nurses.

The program, the first of its kind between the Worcester organizations, runs 12 weeks with Assumption’s student nurses staffing a Designated Education Unit floor of the hospital for three eight-hour shifts per week, according to a Thursday release from the university. The Assumption students will be the only student nurses on the 24-bed floor throughout the duration of the program.

“The exposure our students will receive on the medical surgical floor will be extraordinary,” Caitlin Stover, dean of the Froelich School of Nursing at Assumption, said in the press release. “They will be exposed to anything and everything, the broadest range of medical diagnoses and diverse patients across the lifespan.”

Saint Vincent is a 381-bed hospital in Worcester, which reached an agreement to end a 301-day strike by the Massachusetts Nurses Association union at the hospital in early 2022, a fight largely centered around patient-to-nurse staffing ratios. The 15 Assumption students will work on a rotating schedule supervised by clinical faculty, according to the release. The program kicked off last week, and is intended to help address the ongoing nursing shortage.

The 15 Assumption students will work on a rotating schedule supervised by clinical faculty, according to the release. The program kicked off last week, and is intended to help address the ongoing nursing shortage.