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Benefits of lower nurse to patient ratios
Nurse to patient ratio problems
Nurse to patient ratio problems
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Over the past years, there has been a nursing shortage which has led to the need of more registered nurses in the hospital setting. This is the result of higher acuity of patient care and a decrease in their length of hospital stay. In order for the patients to get safe and quality care, the staffing, education and experience of the nursing staff needs to be made a priority. Because of the lack of nurses, patient quality of care has suffered. Many nurses, including myself, face the issue of understaffing and having too much of a workload during one shift. Nurses get burnt out more quickly when working on an understaffed unit. The patient also suffers by not receiving the care they deserve. The issue of nurse-patient ratio is a touchy area …show more content…
The second approach is for legislators to mandate specific nurse-patient ratios in regulation that all healthcare facilities will follow. Two main staffing methods that are currently used in most nursing facilities are staffing by patient acuity using patient classification systems and staffing by mandated nurse-to-patient rations. Each method has an impact on patient outcomes, safety and overall satisfaction determined from different articles and studies done on each staffing method. There are pros and cons to each staffing methods. Nursing facilities look at many of these pros and cons when determining staffing methods that are used, cost, patient outcomes, and nursing …show more content…
The level of job satisfaction for a nurse is a vital factor in creating positive outcomes for their patients. California RNs report having much more time to spend with patients. The hospitals are far more likely to have enough RNs on staff to provide quality patient care. In California, where hospitals have better compliance with the staffing limits, RNs report fewer complaints from patients and families and the nurses have more confidence that patients can manage their care upon discharge. California RNs are substantially more likely to stay in their jobs because of the staffing limits, and less likely to report burnout than nurses in any other state. Two years after implementation of the California staffing law which mandates minimum staffing levels by hospital unit, nurse workloads in California were significantly lower than that of any other state. The legislation of the mandated nurse patient ratio has achieved its goals of reducing nurse workloads, improving recruitment and retention of nurses, and having a favorable outcomes on patient
The problem, as defined for my argument research paper, is that to cut costs, hospitals have been steadily increasing the number of patients nurses must care for. In many areas it's not uncommon for one nurse to have to assess, give medications to, and manage the care of as many as 12 patients. This puts tremendous strain on nurses. Many of the studies I have seen in my research indicate that a high ration of patients to nurses increases the rate of death or other poor outcomes for patients. It also leads to increased nurse burnout and higher turnover, though at this point I believe my paper will focus on patient outcomes.
Many nurses face the issue of understaffing and having too much of a workload during one shift. When a unit is understaffed not only do the nurses get burnt out, but the patients also don’t receive the care they deserve. The nurse-patient ratio is an aspect that gets overlooked in many facilities that could lead to possible devastating errors. Nurse- patient ratio issues have been a widely studied topic and recently new changes have been made to improve the problem.
...s, C., & Hess, R. (2009). Registered Nurses' Perceptions of Nurse Staffing Ratios and New Hospital Payment Regulations. Nursing Economic$, 27(6), 372-376. Retrieved from Academic Search Complete database.
There is a shortage of all health care professions throughout the United States. One shortage in particular that society should be very concerned about is the shortage of Registered Nurses. Registered Nurses make up the single largest healthcare profession in the United States. A registered nurse is a vital healthcare professional that has earned a two or four year degree and has the upper-most responsibility in providing direct patient care and staff management in a hospital or other treatment facilities (Registered Nurse (RN) Degree and Career Overview., 2009). This shortage issue is imperative because RN's affect everyone sometime in their lifetime. Nurses serve groups, families and individuals to foster health and prevent disease.
I think shortages of nurses can also be a factor in why nurses are overworked and stressed. In most hospitals you can’t even tell if there is a nurse shortage, the nurses run around from patient to patient I’m trying to still provide the same quality care. My aunt is a registered nurse for Northeast medical center and I asked her out of the previously 11 listed reasons nurses are stressed which do you experience the most. She replied, “I have to say that I experience number one which is work overload the most. When I started working as a nurse 37 years ago there were three separate shifts throughout a day and there’s could work instead of the two 7am-7pm. The nursed patient ratio was a lot lower we got to spend time with the patients we had during the day and provide individual attention. You didn’t feel overwhelmed because the hospital had enough nurses. Now they nurses doing e same amount of work as two or three nurses combined, and are still expected to do
Since the 1990’s, the interest in nursing and the profession as a whole has decreased dramatically and is still expected to do so over the next 10-15 years according to some researchers. With this nursing shortage, many factors are affected. Organizations have to face challenges of low staffing, higher costs for resources, recruiting and reserving of registered nurses, among liability issues as well. Some of the main issues arising from this nurse shortage are the impact of quality and continuity of care, organizational costs, the effect it has on nursing staff, and etc. However, this not only affects an organization and community, but affects the nurses the same. Nurses are becoming overwhelmed and are questioning the quality of care that each patient deserves. This shortage is not an issue that is to be taken lightly. The repercussions that are faced by both nurses and the organization are critical. Therefore, state funding should be implemented to private hospitals in order to resolve the shortage of nurses. State funds will therefore, relieve the overwhelming burdens on the staff, provide a safe and stress free environment for the patient, and allow appropriate funds needed to keep the facility and organization operational.
Working in long-term care can be overwhelming. Imagine you are a new graduate nurse putting your new found knowledge and skills to practice for the first time. Your orientation lasted three days which is standard for nurse home orientation compared to hospital orientation that last approximately six to eight weeks for new grads. The shift has just begun and already you have a new admit, new found pressure ulcer to assess, a possible medication reaction, several new orders to take off and eight patients to document on for varying reasons. Feelings of frustration and confusion take over as you are the only nurse on the unit along with a Certified Medication Technician (CMT) and three Certified Nursing Assistants (CNAs) taking care of 47 patients. Ideal nurse-to-patient ratio continues to be a national issue in both the hospital and long-term care setting (LTC). In the LTC setting there is no official nurse-to-patient ratio; there is a suggested staff-to-patient ratio. This issue not only affects the new licensed nurses but the seasoned nurse as well. Recently, there has been controversial debates as to whether heavy workloads are detrimental to patients. The federal, state, and local government regulates many aspects of healthcare. However, it is the physicians, nurses and other healthcare professional that provide care directly to patients. Consequently, does insufficient staffing, heavy workloads, and unsupportive work environment directly contribute to poor patient satisfaction, nurse burnout, high turnover and job dissatisfaction?
Patient’s safety will be compromised because increase of patient to nurse ratio will lead to mistakes in delivering quality care. In 2007, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) conducted a metanalysis and found that “shortage of registered nurses, in combination with increased workload, poses a potential threat to the quality of care… increases in registered nurse staffing was associated with a reduction in hospital-related mortality and failure to rescue as well as reduced length of stay.” Intense workload, stress, and dissatisfaction in one’s profession can lead to health problems. Researchers found that maintaining and improving a healthy work environment will facilitate safety, quality healthcare and promote a desirable professional avenue.
Thousands of nurses throughout the nation are exhausted and overwhelmed due to their heavy workload. The administrators do not staff the units properly; therefore, they give each nurse more patients to care for to compensate for the lack of staff. There are several reasons to why
Nurses Joe and Sarah have been working in a medical surgical unit that has been experiencing a nursing shortage, which has led to an increase in the workload. Sarah has been feeling the physical effects of the stress and feels there is a lack of management support, while Joe experiences some feelings of being overwhelmed, but tries to use it as learning experiences. Joe has developed positive methods of coping, while Sarah is quickly heading towards burnout. Implications and Conclusions The information provided in the literature has great implications for practice in many units, including the writers. It is with great hopes that the research published can be presented to the committees on the unit in hopes that some of the workloads can be decreased to help with staffing and retention rates.
Nurse to patient ratios are extremely paramount in assisting with overall patient mortality and wellness of our nurses. It is an issues which unfortunately affected by legislation of our government (which is affect specifically on a monetary basis). My research via Academic Search Complete allowed me to identify topics that assist my PICOT question, and enables me to further analyze and research to find out what issues directly affect is matter. Proper nurse to patient ratio, operational costs, government regulation, nurse work life and health, patient wellness, and nursing procedures and duration of those procedures are all affected by this topic and we must ensure that all are properly balanced.
These articles have many similarities when discussing the issue of staffing shortages. For patients, their loved ones and the general population, they don’t understand the ramifications and strain that staffing shortages have on nurses. People expect and deserve complete, competent and safe care when they are patients. These articles bring to light all the struggles that nurses have to deal with. Nurses are fearful that they will make mistakes, will harm patients, and will harm themselves. (Bae, 2012; Erlen, 2001; Martin, 2015) Overtime can be overwhelming and exhausting, which can lead to errors being made. (Bae, 2012; Erlen, 2001) These articles perceive that it may be beneficial for nurses, patients, and healthcare facilities to decrease the nurse-to-patient ratio, however, this option is not always
Hospital understaffing nurses increases the workload and the patient-to-nurses ratio makes a difference in patient outcome. In hospital with high patient-to-nurse ratios, surgical patient experience higher risk and failure-to-rescue rates and nurses are more likely to experience burnout and dissatisfaction. Nurses nationwide consistently report that hospital staffing levels are inadequate to provide safe and effective care (Cimiotti et al., 2012). In 2004, California was the first state to implement minimum patient-to-nurse staffing ratios. The legislation was motivated by an increasing hospital nursing shortage and perception that lower nurse retention in hospital practice was related to burdensome workloads and high level of job dissatisfaction. California fully mandated the patient-to-nurse ratio for every surgical patient is 1 to 5 (American Nurses Association, 2016). California is the only state that stipulates in law and regulations a required minimum nurse-to-patient ratio to be maintained at all times by the unit (American Nurses Association, 2016). Based on the result in California, the Registered Nurse Staffing Act has resulted in states taking action to ensure there is optical nurse staffing is appropriated to patients’ needs, however not all states have as strict regulations as California (American Nurses Association, 2016). Thus, the California
Factors such as, heavy workloads, stress, job dissatisfaction, frequent medical errors, and intention of leaving the job are all common for nurses to experience, especially during the nursing shortage crisis. Not only do the nurses suffer during a shortage, but the patients ' health outcomes suffer even more. For instance, there are higher rates of infectious diseases and adverse patient outcomes, such as urinary tract infections (UTIs), upper gastrointestinal bleeding, shock, pneumonia, prolonged hospital stays, failure to rescue, and mortality. As a result, this leads to higher re-admission rates for patients. Furthermore, high patient-to-nurse ratios cause heavy workloads due to an inadequate supply of nurses, an increased demand for nurses, a reduction in staffing and an increase in overtime, and a shortened length of stay for patients. Without the heavy workloads that nurses have to endure on a daily basis, there would more time for nurses to communicate more effectively with physicians, insurance companies, and patients and their families. Those heavy workloads are the result of hospitals reducing the nursing staff and implementing mandatory overtime policies just to meet unexpectedly high demands. Unfortunately, the nursing shortage has affected nurses ' mental and physical health. For example, the most common health concerns for nurses include cardiovascular health, occupational injuries and illnesses, and emotional and physical exhaustion. Therefore, safe-staffing ratios/levels have to become the main
Several consequences of high nursing workload have been proven to hinder the quality of patient care. Carayon and Gurses’s research (2008) indicates that heavy workload can contribute to errors, shortcuts, guideline violations, and poor communication with physicians and other providers, thus compromising the quality and safety of patient care. In addition, the research not only implies that patients may not receive proper care, but also they can experience less satisfaction with