Nursing Short Staffing: Examining Causes, Effects, and Solutions

This report delves into the critical issue of nursing short staffing, examining its causes, effects, and potential solutions. It highlights the impact on patient safety, the role of fatigue, and the legal considerations surrounding staffing levels, particularly in intensive care units. The report utilizes a cross-sectional study design and references relevant literature to support its findings. It proposes increasing the number of nurses as a key solution to reduce mortality rates and improve overall healthcare quality. The report also discusses the importance of adhering to regulatory guidelines regarding nurse-to-patient ratios. The study also mentions the use of a simple random sampling method on a sample size of 239 employees in the Chamberlain University. The report concludes that increased nurse staffing is crucial for improving patient outcomes and promoting a healthier healthcare environment.

Short Staffing in Nursing
Student’s Name
Professor’s Name
Institutional Affiliation

Research Questions
• What is the main reason nurses leave healthcare jobs?
• How can the challenge facing nurses be corrected?
• What are the legal considerations?

Research Methods
Cross-sectional study
• The researcher used a sample size of 239 employees in
Chamberlain University (Slawson, 2014).
• The research participants used simple random sampling method.
• Later descriptive analyses were performed.

Advantages and disadvantage of cross-sectional
method
Advantages Disadvantages
It is quick and easy to use.
Can’t determine the causes and impacts (McQuilten, et
al., 2017).
Can be used to prove assumptions. Not used to analyze behaviour.
It is cheap (Ellis, 2016). Snapshot findings might not be represented.

Description of the healthcare scenario
• Staffing is a personal and professional concern for nurses.
• Short staffing is the main reason nurses leave healthcare jobs (Charney,
2012).
• Inadequate staffing threatens patients’ safety and health. For example, they
are prone to wrong drug administration due to nurses fatigue.
• Short staffing may lead to more exceptional complex care.
• Inadequate staffing affects nurses’ health and safety by increasing fatigue and
amount of injury. For example, short staffing make nurses to work on shifts
day and night.
• Short staffing hinders nurses' efforts to carry care processes.
• Lower staffing increases patients’ mortality due to drug administration errors.

Description of the legal consideration
• Health commissions approve a mandate of nurse staffing in the intensive care
unit (ICU) (Larson, 2013).
• The regulatory body requires nurses to be assigned a maximum of two patients in
the intensive care unit (Shaikh, 2017).
• Regulations are applied to all ICUs. For example, both the adults and infants
intensive care unit applies these regulations.

Proposed resolution and
conclusionResolution
• Increase in the number of nurses.
• There need to be no understaffing of nurses in ICU.
Conclusion
• Higher nurse staffing reduces the mortality rate.
• Increased number of nurses promotes health.

References
• Charney, W. (2012). Epidemic of medical errors and hospital-acquired infections:
systemic and social causes. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.
• Ellis, P. (2016). Understanding research for nursing students. Learning Matters.
• Larson, J. A. (2013). Management engineering: a guide to best practices for
industrial engineering in health care. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.
• McQuilten, Zatta, Andrianopoulos, Aoki, Stevenson, Badami, . . . Wood. (2017).
Evaluation of clinical coding data to determine causes of critical bleeding in
patients receiving massive transfusion: A bi‐national, multicentre, cross‐sectional
study. Transfusion Medicine, 27(2), 114-121.
• Shaikh, N. (2017). Intensive care. Norderstedt, Germany: BoD – Books on
Demand.
• Slawson, W. D. (2014). The new inflation: the collapse of free markets.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.