Research Summary and Ethical Considerations: Complexity in Practice Environments Grand Canyon University: NRS 433V 1/12/2014 Title Needed This article discusses the complexity in nursing practice environments that affect patient outcomes. There are many different aspects of the relationship between nursing care and patient outcomes. Nurses struggle to provide quality care in a high-demand practice environment, all the while dealing with stressors. Through research of the nurse work environment three key stressors that influence the quality of care given by nurses were identified. This new phenomenon has been labeled complexity compression.
The Joint Commission (2012) defines risk management in healthcare as “the clinical and administrative acts undertaken to identify and evaluate the risk of injury to staff, patients and visitors and the risk to loss of the organization itself”. Studies have shown that the litigation against nursing homes is on the rise; thus making risk management very important in day to day care. Malpractice insurance premiums for nursing homes are also on the rise; this contributes to bankruptcy and forces many facilities to operate without malpractice coverage (Weinburg M.D & Levine, 2008). This threatens quality of care and access to healthcare for ill elderly people that need round the clock care. Effective risk management in a nursing home requires one to accurately
Hospitals versus Nursing Homes A general acute care hospital refers to an institution which may or may not be operated as a profit or not for profit controlled by the state government agency, municipality that operates in the diagnosis, care and treatment to patients suffering from an illness or injury that require interventions such as emergent care, outpatient care or other medical/nursing care for periods greater than 24 hours (Acute care, n.d.). A nursing home refers to a facility licensed by the department of health (DOH) in the provision of room and board and medical oversight. Nursing home residents typically require continuous nursing care due to their mental status and debilitated health status (Long term care, n.d.). Furthermore, The Ominbus Reconcilitation Act of 1987 requires one RN on duty 24 hours per day in nursing homes which increases the cost to the government by about 75 M in addition to current staffing costs (Strahan, 1988). A hospital’s size commonly dictates the particular organizational structure it employs.
Week Five: Systematic Article Review Martha Mireles NURS 518 December 24,2012 Margaret L. Colucciello Week Five: Systematic Article Review Background Information The profession of nursing is associated with a highly stressful environment. Dealing with people on a daily basis who are sick or diseased is hard enough without the external environmental stressors that accompany nursing. Things such as working long hours, working short handed and attitudes of co-workers can always contribute to stress and raise the level of stress. Nursing students on the other hand have all of the above stressors with the added stressor of academic performance. With the problem at hand implementation of stress management interventions of both nurses and students have been suggested (Galbraith,& Brown, 2011).
The Ethical and Legal Issues of withdrawal of treatment or life support Willie Hudson State College of Florida Ethical & Legal Issues in Health Care NUR 3826 Dr. Keri Hockett September 10, 2014 The Ethical and Legal Issues of withdrawal of treatment or life support As a critical care nurse in a very busy fast paced intensive care unit, I deal with life and death circumstances on a daily basis. The patients’ in our unit are very ill and have multiple comorbidities, in which subsequently the outcome is often death. Although, death is the conclusion of life, I strongly believe that nurses must advocate for their patients and families, to honor and respect patient’s advanced directives within their scope of practice. Approximately 20% of all deaths in the United States occur in an intensive care unit, with roughly 70% to 90% of these deaths following a decision to withdraw life support. The critical care nurse plays a vital role in the withdrawal of life support because they are present at the bedside more than any other team member of the health care team and are responsible for carrying out physician’s orders to withdraw artificial support (Kirchhoff & Kowalkowski, 2010).
Prescriptive Authority and Nurse Practitioners Kaymie Chandler Johnston Austin Peay State University Healthcare Policy NURS 5001 February 7, 2013 Prescriptive Authority and Nurse Practitioners There are many healthcare policy issues that affect nurse practitioners today and in the future. The Affordable Care Act is to add approximately 32 million Americans to the roles of the insured at a time when there is a shortage of primary care providers. (Fairman, Rowe, Hassmiller, Shalala 2011). Nurse practitioners will be part of the solution for this shortage, but with ever tightening restrictions on the care that they can provide, it will prove more and more difficult to ease the strain on an already over-burdened system. One policy that is especially concerning and confusing to many advanced practice nurses and future advanced practice nurses is prescriptive authority.
Nursing Burnout According to McIntyre & McDonald, (2010) “Problem-solving and decision making have been ingrained in the discipline of nursing since its inception”(p.6). Today nurses are feeling at an even greater need to examine and articulate issues facing them in practice on a daily basis. Nurses are also faced with increasingly complex issues in multiple areas of practice, the need for political advocacy has emerged (McIntyre & McDonald, 2010). With a growing sense of leadership and political action, nursing advocacy has led to examination of topics in search of resolutions. High levels of work place stress and professional burnout continually affects nurses and other health care workers globally.
Solutions for Nursing Personnel Shortages Executive Summary Senior Human Resource Management should adopt some changes in order to combat the current growing nursing/healthcare personnel shortage. Employees simply want to be heard and sympathized with. Nowadays the nursing shortage has caused many problems in the healthcare industry. First and foremost, the quality of care being provided to patients is declining due to the fact that there are not as many nurses to care for the patient appropriately. As a matter of fact, the workload being dumped on the employees is steadily increasing.
My role within the team is that of senior staff nurse, I am responsible and accountable to my ward manager and together we lead the whole nursing team of 40 people. The workplace problem that my manager and I identified is our responsibility to resolve as we have a duty to ensure we provide effective leadership and management to the staff we employ in order that we have an effective team that will provide the best possible service to our users. 2. Description of the problem The nursing team is not working effectively due to the recent merge. As a team we need to establish exactly which areas need addressing first as staff are currently unable to clearly define any particular problem.
Hospital Acquired Infection (HAI), or as it is sometimes referred to as Nosocomial infection; is an infection occurring in patients after admission to hospital that was neither present nor incubating at the time of admission. This student will discuss the role of the nurse in preventing hospital acquired infection while on clinical placement, define HAI, and look at the causes of HAI and how it is spread. This student will also show in order to minimise these risks, systems must in place, understood and implemented by all concerned. Plowman (1997) claimed that, 6,000 deaths per year are caused by HAI, with significant financial costs for the NHS and personal costs for patients’ families. Other factors include separation from family, anxiety, sense of isolation and stigma.