Statistics of American Nursing Population

As of 2010, there were 2,909,357 licensed RNs in the U.S.  Approximately 4.2% identify themselves as African American, 3.1% are either Asian, Native American, or Pacific Islander, 1.7% or Hispanic/Latino, and 1.4% of the entire nursing population categorize themselves as bi- or mulitracial.  There are roughly 122,495 black or African American nurses out of 2,909,357 total registered nurses.  African American nurses are more common in the South Atlantic, West South Central, and East South Central than anywhere else in America.  Black nurses, along with Asian/Pacific Islander nurses, are more likely than other nurses to hold a minimum of a Bachelor's degree in nursing, and 14.2% of black nurses have a master's or Doctorate degree compared with only 13.2% of Caucasian nurses (MinorityNurse.com, 2010, Nursing Statistics).  These statistics show that approximately 17,394 black nurses are masters or doctorally educated, whereas 348,404 is the approximated number of Casucasian nurses who hold higher level degrees.