How to Reduce Nurse Turnover at Your Facility in 2026

Despite a gradual decrease over the past several post-pandemic years, nurse turnover rates in the U.S. remain high, creating financial burdens for facilities and disruptions in patient care. Over 138,000 nurses left the workforce over the past four years, and another 40% report the intent to leave or retire in the near future. With roughly 36 million patients getting admitted to hospitals each year, this can be quite frustrating for the nurses providing care in understaffed facilities.

Here we’ll examine the statistics and factors surrounding this critical issue, and look at trends across the industry. You’ll also learn about emerging strategies for retaining your high-performing staff, and how to leverage new technology to create work conditions for nurses that are conducive to job satisfaction. Though reducing nursing turnover rates isn’t easy or simple work, it can be done — as many healthcare leaders are proving.

Nursing Turnover Statistics: Overview

Nursing staff turnover may be stabilizing after the highs seen during the early-2020s pandemic, but rates remain higher than they were pre-pandemic and also significantly higher than in other industries. Here are some key statistics to consider:

• RN turnover is currently estimated at 16.4%, which is a 2% decrease from the previous year and a 10.7% decrease from peak turnover rates seen during the pandemic.
• The RN specialty areas with the highest turnover are emergency care, behavioral health, and step-down care.
• Home healthcare agencies are experiencing extremely high churn, with an estimated 79.2% of nurses leaving their positions each year.
• 24% of Gen Z nurses left their roles in 2025 — citing reasons like insufficient support in the workplace.

More Statistics: RN Turnover in Nursing Homes

Research from the National Database of Nursing Quality Indicators (NDNQI) has shown that higher nursing staff turnover rates are associated with a lower quality of care. In an effort to improve health outcomes, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) now incorporates nursing turnover rates into their Nursing Home Five-Star Quality Rating System. With data now being collected from over 15,000 long-term care (LTC) facilities, nurse turnover statistics specific to nursing home staff turnover are finally emerging.

The Long-Term Care Community Coalition (LTCCC) publishes regular alerts and reports on nursing home staffing and safety based on the data received from CMS’s mandatory reporting requirements. Their data shows high RN staff turnover rates in recent years, with overall nursing staff turnover rates approaching 50%, and RNs in particular hovering around 45%. According to the 2025-2026 Nursing Home Salary and Benefits Report the turnover rate for RNs working in nursing homes fell slightly in 2025, to approximately 36.5%.

To put the nursing home staff turnover rate into perspective, it’s more than double that of the hospital nursing staff turnover rate of 16.4%. Long-term care facilities must replace over half of their nursing staff each year, which can have a significant impact on the quality of care they’re able to provide.

Cost of Nurse Turnover

The financial impact of employee turnover affects hospitals nationwide. For instance, the average cost of turnover for a bedside RN is $61,110, an 8.6% increase from the prior year. For the average U.S. hospital, this results in as much as $5.7 million in losses per year. Additionally, each 1% change in RN turnover costs or saves the average hospital $289,000 annually. While nursing home staff salaries are less than hospital staff salaries, it’s reasonable to speculate that the costs of nurse turnover for long-term care facilities are also prohibitive.

In addition to the clear monetary costs of nursing turnover, poor retention also places nursing home residents at risk. Studies show that nursing homes with high nursing staff turnover rates also experience:

• Poorer health outcomes for residents.
• Higher rates of fraud and abuse citations.
• Higher rates of substantiated resident complaints to CMS.
• Decreased overall CMS Five-Star Ratings.

Notable Nursing Turnover Trends for 2026

The issue of high turnover rates in healthcare has garnered a significant amount of attention since the extreme spike in 2020 pushed it into crisis territory, leading staff nurses and leadership alike to look for solutions. Here are some trends to pay attention to this year.

Prioritizing Long-Term Culture Improvements Over Quick Fixes

The prominent article Nurse turnover: Understand it, reduce it, written by nurses Franklin A. Shaffer and Leah Curtin, served as a helpful resource for the past five years, reminding those in healthcare to take cues from successful businesses in corporate America at large rather than operating in a vacuum.

The article presents a case for creating a performance-enhancing culture for nursing staff, and avoiding major mistakes such as enforcing mandatory overtime to fix staffing issues. This guidance, along with voices of other nurse leaders, points organizations toward doing the deep work necessary to create positive shifts in workplace culture. We now know, without a doubt, that it’s crucial to provide nurses with a workplace where they’re motivated to engage with the challenges inherent to the job.

The Rise of Flexible Scheduling Options

As one facet of the strategy to improve workplace culture, facilities across the U.S. are moving away from rigid staffing models and toward more flexible staffing solutions. Organizations taking this approach tend to incorporate temporary, contract, per-diem, and travel nurses into their staffing matrix to help during periods of high patient acuity and resource shortages. In a recent survey that addressed the effectiveness of various staff retention strategies, tactics with above-average success rates included:

• Accommodating necessary days off.
• Offering flexible scheduling options.
• Listening and responding to scheduling feedback from staff.

Increased Use of Technology

Another important trend seen in acute and long-term care facilities is the increased use of technology to reduce clinician workload and improve the workplace experience. Recent technological advancements include:

• Remote patient monitoring to decrease the number of patients needing in-person care.
• Automated nurse charting workflows and integration of ambient AI to reduce time spent on documentation.
• Patient education materials prepared by artificial intelligence (AI).
• Clinical decision support tools that leverage AI to improve patient outcomes and nurse job satisfaction.

How to Reduce Nurse Turnover: 5 Tips

Now that we’ve reviewed the statistics and costs associated with staff turnover, it’s time to discuss possible solutions that can help your facility. The following five tips can help you stabilize your nursing workforce and improve the quality of care you’re able to provide.

1. Identify the Primary Causes of Nurse Turnover at Your Facility

Staff turnover is a complex issue, with multiple contributing factors. Poor working conditions, low pay and lack of benefits, and a demanding role are common reasons for high staff turnover.

Our Nursing Trends Survey revealed that 85% of nurses who provided feedback felt overworked, with 45% stating that they plan to leave the profession altogether. When planning retention strategies, you’ll want to work with your nurse management team to engage your nursing staff and identify the main causes of turnover in your facility.

2. Protect Your Nursing Staff From Burnout

Burnout among nurses is often associated with high attrition rates. By mitigating or preventing the causes of burnout, your facility can create a workplace where your residents thrive and your nurses succeed. You can start by:

• Encouraging staff to find work-life balance.
• Developing flexible scheduling options.
• Limiting (or eliminating) mandatory overtime whenever possible.
• Providing specialized education and training.
• Promoting a healthy work environment.

3. Offer Competitive Wages and Benefits

Consider researching the pay and benefits being offered by other local facilities to ensure your organization’s offerings are competitive. If your facility can’t pay a high salary, other monetary incentives or staggered salary increases can help keep employees engaged.

4. Provide Transformational Leadership

The American Nurses Association (ANA) defines the transformational nurse leader as one who inspires their fellow nurses to achieve success by helping them to develop their strengths and including them in their greater vision. Transformational leadership improves registered nurses’ communication, motivation, and retention rates. It’s much easier for nursing staff to persevere through challenging work situations when they have a positive relationship with their managers and are engaged in their workplace.

5. Adopt an Employee-First Culture

To reduce turnover, nursing supervisors and leaders must show respect and appreciation for employees. An examination of the extremely poor retention rates in the home health sector shows that top reasons that nurses walk away from their jobs include poor relationships with their immediate supervisors, and feelings of being overlooked and underappreciated.

To combat this, nurses in supervisory and leadership positions can seek to facilitate an employee-first (person-centered) culture. Organizations that recognize staff as their most significant asset, include them in decision-making, and prioritize employee wellness see significantly lower turnover rates than those that don’t.

Utilize Flexible Staffing Strategies That Support Your Nurses

Trying to prevent nurse turnover and burnout during a staffing crisis can be challenging. We’re here to help. Partner with us today to learn more about the many ways we can help you fill your empty shifts with well-trained nursing professionals.

IntelyCare writer Diana Campion, MSN, APRN, ANP-C, contributed to the research and writing of this article.