In the United States, there is an increasing tendency of nursing shortages. The number of nurses on staff has an impact on a range of sectors within the nursing field. One of the most affected areas is patient care quality. Inadequate nurse staffing levels in healthcare have resulted in poor patient outcomes. Employees are also impacted by inadequate nurse staffing in health care. This is due to increased workload and job discontent, which reduces total patient care. Low levels have also resulted in increased nurse burnout and poor patient outcomes. Inadequate staffing makes it difficult for nurses to do their job ethically. One of the affected ethical principal is no-maleficence which requires nurses to avoid harming the patient. Also, low levels of nursing affect the principal of beneficence that requires the patient to act in a way that benefits patients. Low levels of nursing have not only the effect on moral demand of nurses but also the profession. Without legislation and laws of supporting ethical principles, the quality of care and safety of the patient is at risk (Martin, 2017).
Shortage of nurses in nursing faculty and its impact
Shortage of nurses is also experienced in nurses' faculty as most of the educators are reaching retirement age and most of the people have abandoned the career. This also leads to a low number of nurse graduates due to low educators. This paper evaluates the impact of nurse shortage and the future of healthcare and nursing. Also, the paper provides the solution of the negative impact caused by low levels of nursing staffing (Pelayo, 2010).
Impact of Nurse Staffing
Nurse staffing affects various individuals in nursing colleges and healthcare. Staffing of nurses have the impact on the following:
Hospital Nursing Staff
Adequate staffing of nurses in hospitals saves lives. Hospitals that have recorded low levels of the patient to nurse ratio have shown to reduce the rate of mortality by more than 50%. Poor staffing of nurses in hospitals has indicated increased rate of mortality. This has led to the adverse outcome of patient care and health. Nurse in hospitals with low staffing has also shown high burnout compared to hospitals which are adequately staffed. This has affected the outcome, well-being, and health of nurses. The unrealistic workload can also result in poor patterns of sleep, chronic fatigue, job dissatisfaction and absenteeism of staff (Martin, 2017).
Patients
The satisfaction of patients is the main indication of the high quality of patient care in healthcare. Poor outcome of the patient that include shock, pneumonia, urinary track and cardiac arrest are directly related to low staffing of nurses. In hospitals where there are higher rates of nurses' staff to patient, there rate of the adverse outcome is also low increasing the satisfaction of the patient and the quality of care. Patient has more benefit with hospitals with more nurses than the hospital that is experiencing the shortage. Adequate staffing allows the patient to access quality medical care (Pelayo, 2010).
Hospitals
The staffing of nurses also has an impact on hospitals as general. The staffing in a hospital plays a major role as its affects the quality of care and patient safety offered to patients in the hospital. A hospital that is adequately staffed can take care of critically and acutely ill patients compared to hospitals with fewer nurses. Poor staffing puts pressure on the management of the hospital so as to avoid harm to patients. The hospital also incurs the more substantial cost to ensure that low level of nurses can work overtime. Staffing the hospitals will ensure that they can manage the number of patients and also cut on their budget (Pelayo, 2010).
Nursing Education
Nursing education has also been affected by the shortage of nurses. Most of the nurse educators have been retiring without finding more to replace them. This has affected the education sector and led to the low enrolment of nurses in school. This has led to an adverse shortage in the market as the government cannot find nurses to employ in hospitals (Martin, 2017).
Possible Solutions
To increase the nurses in hospitals, there is need to implement measures to increase staffing in hospitals. These include:
Promotion of Career Development
Nursing schools have experienced the shortage of student in recent past. This has affected the number of available nurses to be employed in healthcare units. Promotion of nursing career will ensure that the number of nurses in the market is increased. When a high number of student are enrolled in nursing hospitals, they will help in reduction of the patient to nurse ratio (Martin, 2017).
Federal Involvement
The government should ensure that it implements legislation and laws that will help in increasing the number of nurses in hospitals. The laws should consider good incentives that would promote more people to consider becoming nurses as well as legislation that are aimed at improving the welfare of nurses. This would reduce nurse shortage in hospitals (Pelayo, 2010).
Conclusion
Safe staffing of nurses improves the outcome of patient nurses and healthcare. The increased staffing of nurses will ensure that there is the change in the outcome of the patient. Nursing shortage ensures that hospitals will reduce the mortality of patients and the nurses will work with minimal pressure providing quality care. If the possible solution to the shortage of nurses is implemented effectively, there will be available nurses to be posted in hospitals and more people will consider undertaking the course (Pelayo, 2010).
References
Martin C. (2017). 'The Effects of Nurse Staffing on Quality of Care.' Journal on nursing
Education, 24(2); 4-8.
Pelayo L. (2010). 'Responding to the nursing shortage: Collaboration in an innovate paradigm for nursing education.' Journal on Nursing Education Perspective. 34(5); 351- 353.
