The Human Resource Management team has the ability to make the necessary changes to combat the nursing shortage. Rearranging workloads amongst staff members alone would help immensely. The majority of nurses experience burnout from a combination of factors such as age, emotional tiredness, depersonalization in the work area, and a feeling of underachievement being that so many tasks are placed on any one individual. We must remember that illness will always be around. Without the help of Human Resources, the problem of maintaining a healthy patient to nurse ratio will continue to grow.
Healthcare organizations are finding it difficult to provide quality healthcare services in a timely manner due to the nursing staff shortages. Healthcare facilities are attempting to develop solutions to solve this shortage problem, but the current solutions are resulting in short term negative impacts. This warrants the need to continue to look for innovative ways to offset the additional costs as well as the reduction in quality that is being felt. NURSING STAFF SHORTAGES Nursing Staff Shortages: Why is There a Problem and What Can be Done to Solve It? A large problem in today’s healthcare environment is a shortage of nurses to fill positions.
Reducing nurse staffing can lead to overworked nurses, low staff morale, less patient satisfaction, and errors and more malpractice suits, which can raise the costs much more than hiring more nurses (Garretson). Even when hospitals do plan to increase their nursing staff levels, they are unable to do so because increasing nursing staff levels is not an easy task. Major factors contributing to lower staffing levels include a nationwide gap between the number of available positions and the number of registered nurses (RNs) qualified and willing to fill them. The acute shortage of nurses is making it difficult for hospitals to fill RN positions and a study found that 44% of hospital recruiters had more difficulty filling in positions in 2006 than in 2005 (AHA, 2007). The nursing shortage is a major obstacle in health care industry today that threatens to decrease nurses productivity, efficiency, competency, quality, etc and in turn increase fatigue, burnout, nurse-to-patient ratios, etc.
There is currently a larger nurse-to-patient ratio than most nurses would like. Along with the stress and long hours associated with the career choice of nursing, nurse burnout is a very common complaint in today’s society. Nurses often complain of being short staffed and having too large of a patient load. Interest in this topic comes from wanting to pursue management at some point in my career and working on a floor in which a second shift nurse could have twelve patients. Not only will nurses feel better, but better patient outcomes occur when units are better staffed.
Perhaps the biggest impact that the Impact on Nursing (IOM) report had on the nursing profession in general was creating an awareness of what is needed. Some changes in the right direction have been made, but most of the literature seems state, or at least suggest, that not enough has been done, or, given the widespread shortage of nurses, or can be done. For this reason, even more change is needed in the areas of nursing education, nursing practice, and nursing leadership. One of the areas of greatest concern when it comes to the future of nursing is education. There is a shortage of nurses, and not enough seats in nursing education programs to allow for everybody who applies to nursing school to be able to pursue a degree in nursing.
Nursing Leadership Style and Nurse Burnout Nursing Leadership Style and Nurse Burnout Nursing is a stressful and demanding profession. Nurses constantly faced with people’s problems, suffering and needs; puts the nursing profession at a high risk for burnout. Nursing leadership plays a significant role in how nurses feel about their work and handle patients (Kanste, 2008). Having worked on a cardiac telemetry unit, which was high stress with high patient turnover and dealing with a manger that was not approachable or visible, has made me realize that burnout was what I was experiencing. Leadership Style This article delves into the different types of leadership style such as transformational, transactional and laissez-faire and there effect on nurse burnout.
Generally the nurses experiences of care for the dementia patient in the acute care setting was one of uncertainty, due to the fact the nurses felt they had a specific lack of knowledge. Nurse’s knowledge and education As the population grows and there’s an increase in the number of dementia patients, nurses in the acute care setting need to be skilled and educated to support patients with dementia as stated by (Archibald & Cunningham 2006 p.55I). Erikson & Saveman (2002) described the lack of specialized education for nurses in regards to dementia patients in the acute care setting. This is of particular concern as there are many demands on nurses in the acute care setting and can influence the nature of the care they give. According to Nolan (2006, p.213) nurses had concerns of
WHY ARE NURSES LEAVING? Nursing shortage has created a serious challenge in the health care delivery system, as there are not enough nurses to meet the patient’s demand. This shortage is a major concern in the health care system as it has a great impact on the quality of care to be provided. It was stated that “ the nursing workforce in the United States, that registered nurse (RN) shortage may exceed five hundred thousand by the year 2025” (American Association of Colleges of Nursing [AACN], 2010; Cipriano, 2006; United States Department of Health and Human Services,2002). Several factors have contributed to Registered Nurses (RNs) leaving clinical nursing practice.
| |The issue I selected is the nursing shortage. | |In your own words, write at least one paragraph that describes the effect of this issue on the health of the public and the future of professional | |nursing. | |The nursing shortage is a real concern. The average age of a nurse is 43 years old which mean a large group of nurses will retire in the near future. | |There is a significant decline in admissions to nursing programs.
Workplace Fatigue; Finding a solution to this common problem I chose to talk about workplace fatigue because it is so common among all types of nurses and needs to be addressed and worked on. A big thing for nurses to do is to understand their limit and signs that they are becoming too tired or stressed. When nurses get stressed it starts to affect their lives at work and home. A major problem with fatigued nurses is patient care. The fatigued nurse becomes overwhelmed and can easily make mistakes such as medication errors or performing procedures on the wrong patient.