Nurses nurturing nurses—what sounds like a good idea recently became a reality when the Academy of Medical-Surgical Nurses, Pitman, N.J., launched its N3 program to retain new nurses with personal and professional mentoring. Seeing that up to half of all new graduates end up leaving their first nursing job within a year, AMSN designed its mentoring program as a research project, complete with an evaluation process that will measure nurse confidence, job satisfaction, and intent to stay or leave the profession. AMSN will report the results next year.

The program is being field-tested in almost 50 institutions nationwide and, according to N3 Coordinator Kathleen Reeves, MSN, RN, requests to participate are accelerating as more people hear about the program. "We initiated the program last summer, and we are looking forward to our first mentor-mentee dyads completing the program. Because the program requires a one year commitment, the evaluation process will take some time. We have had dyads begin the program throughout the past year and are still enrolling new sites," she says.

"We are hoping that the N3 project may be an effective strategy to support the development of professional nurses and enhance retention of new graduate nurses," says Reeves. "Our ultimate goal is to contribute to the personal and professional development of all nurses through relationships that are nurturing and supportive."

For more information, go www.medsurgnurse.org, call (856) 256-2323, or e-mail amsn@ajj.com.