Nursing understaffing becomes a growing concern today as the number of specialists reduces every year. The shortage in this type of care providers has a significant impact on patient outcomes. The lack of well-prepared health workers results in the inability to provide care appropriately and attain better treatment results (Hudson & Shen, 2015). For patients who need specific treatment and constant monitoring of their states, the problem becomes even more sophisticated as they directly depend on staffing and the health unit’s stable functioning. For this reason, the issue of nursing understaffing and patient outcomes is selected for the investigation. Additionally, the improved understanding of the major causes of the problem can help to solve it by using solutions acceptable by nurses.
The chosen question should be investigated by using the hospital setting. The choice is justified by several factors. First, it is possible to collect information about the existing working conditions and analyze how they affect nurses, motivation and readiness to continue working. Second, the current staffing patterns can be investigated to determine whether there is a deficit of specialists or not (Harrington et al., 2020). At the same time, the correlation between nurses’ performance and patients’ outcomes can be outlined and studied to create the framework for the research. Finally, the given setting provides an opportunity to evaluate the effect of a solution on the issue under analysis.
In general, the nursing shortage is one of the central concerns for the healthcare sector today. Statistics show that at the moment, about 11 million additional nurses are demanded to stop the deterioration of the situation and avoid further shortage (Harrington & Edelman, 2018). The tendency towards the aging of the workforce means that the problem will become more topical and demand specific attention (Harrington & Edelman, 2018). The growth in a nurses’ workload due to shortage increases the chance of dying within 30 days from admission by 7%( White, 2017). Treatment outcomes also suffer from a lack of specialists. For instance, there is a direct correlation between low nurse staffing levels and pneumonia rates (Wendsche et al., 2017). In such a way, the scope of the problem is significant and demands specific actions to ensure that clients will be provided with appropriate treatment and care and remain satisfied with their hospital stay and results.
The further decrease in the number of nurses in hospitals might create the basis for the emergence of multiple problems. The direct correlation between outcomes and the low staffing rates shows that patients might experience higher incidence or readmission rates because of the inability to cooperate with their nurse and acquire the needed information (Vermeir et al., 2017). Because there is a tendency towards the growth in the number of chronic diseases, the problem of staffing becomes even more topical as the lack of health workers will mean the poor management of these illnesses.
In such a way, the significance of the topic becomes evident. The high understaffing rates deteriorate the image and effectiveness of the healthcare sector. The forecasted deficit of 11 million nurses can hurt the whole sphere and the health of the nation. Additionally, the staff can also experience a high workload and additional stress. For this reason, there is a need for immediate action (Waring et al., 2018).
The proposed solution presupposes the creation of altered schedules to consider the personal and professional needs of nurses and avoid overworking and high levels of professional burnouts, which also result in high understaffing rates. (Rizany et al., 2019) It might demand interviewing nurses to understand their current needs and requirements to schedules and factors impacting their motivation.
References
Harrington, C., Dellefield, M. E., Halifax, E., Fleming, M. L., & Bakerjian, D. (2020). Appropriate nurse staffing levels for U.S. nursing homes. Health Services Insights. Web.
Harrington, C., & Edelman, T. S. (2018). Failure to meet nurse staffing standards: A litigation case study of a large US nursing home chain. INQUIRY: The Journal of Health Care Organization, Provision, and Financing. Web.
Hudson, C. K., & Shen, W. (2015). Understaffing: An under-researched phenomenon. Organizational Psychology Review, 5(3), 244–263. Web.
Rizany, I., Hariyati, R. T. S., & Afifah, E. (2019). The impact of nurse scheduling management on nurses’ job satisfaction in army hospital: A cross-sectional research. SAGE Open. Web.
Vermeir, P., Degroote, S., Vandijck, D., Mariman, A., Deveugele, M., Peleman, R., Verhaeghe, R., Cambré, B., & Vogelaers, D. (2017). Job satisfaction in relation to communication in health care among nurses: A narrative review and practical recommendations. SAGE Open. Web.
Waring, L., Miller, P. K., Sloane, C., & Bolton, G. (2018). Charting the practical dimensions of understaffing from a managerial perspective: The everyday shape of the UK’s sonographer shortage. Ultrasound, 26(4), 206–213. Web.
Wendsche, J., Hacker, W., & Wegge, J. (2017). Understaffing and registered nurses’ turnover: The moderating role of regular rest breaks. German Journal of Human Resource Management, 31(3), 238–259. Web.
White, E. (2017). A comparison of nursing education and workforce planning initiatives in the United States and England. Policy, Politics, & Nursing Practice, 18(4), 173–185. Web.