Nurse Staffing Ratios: How It Impacts Quality of Care and Patient Safety

Nurse Staffing Ratios
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Nurse Staffing Ratios
Nurse staffing ratios refer to the number of patients a health facility assigns a nurse to attend. Interestingly, it does not take into account ward characteristics or the complexity of care involved (Haegdorens et al., 2019). Adequate staffing ratios are paramount as they ensure efficacy and quality of services. Research, for instance, has established that adequate staffing results in reduced mortality rates, while the contrary is true (Musy et al., 2021). However, situations are not often ideal, which means that some facilities experience inadequate staffing. Several factors contribute significantly to this phenomenon; for instance, in a bid to cut down costs, many hospitals fail to adhere to adequate staffing. In addition, the acute shortage of nurses has adversely affected the staffing ratio. The acute shortage is occasioned by a combination of factors, including nurse burnout and lack of support, which have prompted nurses to seek alternative jobs. Consequently, this has compromised the quality of care and safety of patients.
One notable effect of inadequate staffing is a decline in the quality of services rendered to patients. Ideally, hospitals should have adequate nurses to enhance the quality of patient surveillance. When this is not achievable, nurses spend limited time with patients in direct care. This could result in such incidents as patient falls and escalation of healthcare-related infections (Haegdoren et al., 2019). In addition, low staffing results in overstretching nurses, which inevitably occasions burnout and discontent. Consequently, this leads to increased medical errors, which, in turn, yields increased in-hospital mortality. The consequences bring to the fore the acute need to address inadequate staffing ratios.
How to Rectify Inadequate Staffing Issues
As indicated above, the need to address inadequate staffing ratios arises from the far-reaching consequences the phenomenon occasions. One professional standard of practice that can help mitigate the issue is using on-call nurse systems. These systems allow patients to effectively notify nurses about their needs or concerns (Nursuwars & Rahmatulloh, 2018). In essence, the systems provide excellent ways of communication between patients and nurses. They also allow patients the convenience of reaching nurses without necessarily getting out of their ward rooms. This leads to instant responses, which is especially important in emergencies.
The other strategy that hospitals can use to address the issue of inadequate staffing is by advertising open shifts to the nurses. This strategy allows nurses to work and claim as many extra hours as possible. This strategy can be incorporated with working overtime. It allows nurses to earn extra money by doing extra work. While it may be an expensive undertaking, it provides facilities with the assurance that adequate nurses are available at any given time.
Further, health facilities can adopt flexible work schedules, and the open policy allows nurses the autonomy to sign up for their shifts, and not the other way around (Allah et al., 2020). The strategy signific...