The City Wire (03/20/12) Scarlet Sims
As the economy slowly recovers, the number of traveling nurses is rising, says Becky Kahn, senior vice president of client sales and services at AMN Healthcare. In 2008, there were 25,000 traveling nurses, but that number dropped dramatically to 4,500 in 2009, Kahn says. Currently there are between 9,000 and 10,000 traveling nurses. Some nurses are leaving the traveling nurse industry for permanent jobs, and hospitals are reducing the number of temporary nurses they use, Kahn says.