The largest complement of nurses in memory begins work next week at West Virginia University Hospitals. Some 105 new nursing graduates will begin their first day on the job helping to fill vacancies including staffing 24 new beds in a newly opened eighth floor tower.

Obviously, we have some magnetic appeal because we are attracting all these nurses to work here,said Dottie Oakes, vice president and chief nurse executive of WVUH .We have not had to hire traveling nurses or agency personnel.

WVU Hospitalsmagnetic appealintensified in October 2005, when the American Nurses Credentialing Center named WVU Hospitals a recipient of the Magnet award for excellence in nursing services. The designation recognizes health care organizations that demonstrate excellence in nursing philosophy and practice, adherence to national standards for improving patient care, leadership and sensitivity to cultural and ethnic diversity.

In addition, in September 2007 Working Mother magazine selected WVU Hospitals as one of its 100 Best Companies for working mothers.

Demand for nurses, coupled with retirements and fewer new nurses, is expected to yield a shortage of more than 1 millionregisterednursesby the end of this decade, according to the American Nurses Association.

Like many institutions, WVU Hospitals is still recruiting nurses, but no new hiring on such a mass scale is anticipated, Oakes said.

The new eighth floor tower is devoted to patients following surgery who have left the recovery area but not yet been transferred to a regular hospital floor.

For more information on employment opportunities at WVUH , visitwww.health.wvu.edu.