Nurse Staffing – A Problem That is Getting Out of Hand For Many Hospitals
Nurse staffing has turned out to be a significant problem in many hospitals. Research carried out has shown that hospitals with a low turnout of nurses are more likely to have a higher rate of poor patient outcomes. Most of the reasons for this shortage are patients needing more care and the difference between the number of nurses available. There also seems to be a shortage of registered nurses qualified and ready to fill these vacancies.
Many health care officials view that the only solution to this problem would be to increase the number of nurses recruited. They have to provide nurses with better facilities while at the same time optimizing the quality of care afforded to patients. While nursing staff laws are different from state to state, the shortage of nurses in comparison to the increased healthcare demands across the country.
With stories of medical negligence on the rise, it’s up to hospital administrations to sit up and take notice and get to the root causes. They should start looking for the most trusted LTAC nurse staffing solutions. Because when nurse staffing is not adequately monitored, too much workload and few nurses can put patients’ lives at considerable risk. It’s time for healthcare officials to brass tacks and comes up with viable solutions to put an end or minimize nurse staffing problems without delay.
Given below is a summary of what the different states have to say about the shortage of nurse staffing:
A new law that has been adopted by some states requires all hospitals to form a committee to create nurse staffing plans that are supposed to look into the patient’s requirements. This law also requires that at least 50 percent of this committee be from the nursing profession.
Another similar law enacted by some states wants to address the nurse/patient ratio from the perspective of the patient’s need for hospital care in relevance to his medical condition.
On the other hand, the Oregon nurses union is opposing this plan because, in their opinion, it is not possible to adapt to the same staffing laws for all hospitals. According to them, a nurse in the ICU, for instance, will be assigned only 1 or 2 patients. In comparison, her counterparts on another floor may be assigned 4 to 6 patients.
It is believed that dissatisfaction with one’s job is also responsible for a lower standard in nurse staffing and being overloaded with work, which makes a nurse unhappy with the job situation. This results in the poor quality of care given to the patients. If the condition turns unbearable, the nurse is more likely to leave her employment. This creates a vicious circle where, once again, nurse staffing positions fall vacant, and the ones remaining have to take over the burden of those who have left.