Capstone Project Topic Selection. Health, Medicine, Nursing Essay

Nurse Staffing
Student’s Name
Instructor
Institutional Affiliation
Introduction
Nurse staffing is a major issue in the most of the hospitals. However, for the hospital to achieve improved clinical outcomes, the hospital management should strive to hire nurses who have the appropriate skills mix (Harris & McGillis, 2012). Although the demand for qualified nurses is high, the likelihood of hiring the best is reduced by nursing shortage among other problems. The administration should address this problem within its minimal resources possible to motivate nursed and minimize the risk of suffering burnout (Harrington, Carrillo, & Garfield, 2015). In the process, the hospital will improve the quality of care, patient safety and outcomes, and nurse productivity.
The Problem
Nurse staffing is a significant problem affecting many health institutions but recognizing and acknowledging the problem is an important effort in ensuring it is dealt with. Identifying the factors affecting nurse staffing is the next step. These factors include the shortage of competent nurses, nurse education as well as nurse retention (Rosseter, 2014). Although nurses prefer where they are appreciated for what they do, shortage of skilled nurse remains a problem. This means that reducing nursing turnover and improving retention is the main way of addressing the problem of nurse staffing.
The Setting/Context
Nurse staffing issues can be observed in the facility (hospital) settings as the nurses are attending to the hospitalized patients. However, it is easier and more effective to utilize quality indicators to measure the effects if nursing on nurse commitment, patient safety, quality of care, as well as patient outcomes (Dabney, & Kalisch, 2015). Research shows that patients spend a short time with nurses (few hours or days) and are discharged unlikely to provide sufficient information concerning the impact of level of nurse staffing in that specific hospital or facility.
Describe the Problem
Lately, nurse staffing has been given much attention. However, practically, little has been done to provide full practical solutions to the problem. Hence, there is a need for further research to provide ways of improving the quality of care. Therefore, more researchers should focus on ways of improving hiring and retention of qualified and experienced nurses in our facilities and reduce errors that lead to loss of nurses (CNA, 2015). In the meantime, hospitals can deal with nurse short...