Understaffing of Nurses: Patient Safety and Healthy Workplace Analysis

This presentation addresses the critical issue of nursing understaffing within the Australian healthcare system, highlighting its significant impact on patient safety and workplace health. It explores the causes of understaffing, including high demand, staffing declines, and inadequate nurse supply, and examines the consequences, such as reduced patient safety, lower job satisfaction, and increased healthcare costs. The presentation underscores the importance of addressing understaffing through a review of recent studies (2014-2019) and suggests strategies for improvement, such as enhancing nursing faculty capacity, fostering partnerships, providing nursing scholarships, and transforming the hospital work environment. The conclusion emphasizes the need for interventions to improve patient care and create healthier workplaces, providing a comprehensive overview of the issue and potential solutions.

UNDERSTAFFING
NURSING
Student Name:
Student Number:
Tutor’s Name:

OVERVIEW
 Background
 Objectives
 Outline of the Topic
 Conclusion

Background
 The heavy workload of nurses is a major issue for the
Australian healthcare system.
 Causes of understaffing of nurses:
 high demand for nurses, the decline in staffing and
increased overtime, and an inadequate supply of
nurses (Wang 2016).
 Impact of Understaff nurse
 patient safety (Hall et al. 2014)
 nursing job satisfaction
 high turnover and nursing shortages (Hayward et al.
2016).
 quality healthcare of patients (Mosadeghrad 2014)
 nurse safety and job satisfaction (Gulavani & Shinde
2014)
 patient mortality and increases healthcare cost
(Martin 2015).

Objectives
 To underscore the significant association
between understaffing of nurses and
patient safety and a healthy workplace.
 This will be achieved by undertaking a
systematic review of the most recent
and relevant studies.
 The inclusion criteria: peer-reviewed
articles published between 2014-2019

Conclusion
 Understaffing of nurses is critical
because it determines patient safety
and a healthy workplace.
 Heavy nursing workload is associated
with suboptimal patient care and
consequently reduced patient
satisfaction and even mortality.
 Thus, there is a need for the invention
of strategies that would address the
understaffing of nurses in order to
improve patient safety and a healthy
workplace.

Suggestions
 Improving the capacity of nursing faculty
through the design of new models of
education.
 Partnerships between institutions and
businesses to develop mutually
rewarding agreements for services (Ball,
Doyle & Oocumma 2015).
 Nursing scholarships as a way of
increasing the number of employees and
making the profession more attractive
(Lamadah & Sayed 2014).
 Transformation of the hospital work
environment (Dawson et al. 2014).

References
Ball, K., Doyle, D. & Oocumma, N.I., 2015, Nursing shortages in the OR: solutions for new
models of education. AORN journal, 101(1), pp.115-136.
Dawson, A.J., Stasa, H., Roche, M.A., Homer, C.S. & Duffield, C., 2014, Nursing churn and
turnover in Australian hospitals: nurses perceptions and suggestions for supportive
strategies. BMC nursing, 13(1), p.11.
Gulavani, A. & Shinde, M., 2014, Occupational stress and job satisfaction among
nurses. International Journal of Science and Research (IJSR), 3(4), pp.733-740.
Hall, L.H., Johnson, J., Watt, I., Tsipa, A. & O’Connor, D.B., 2016, Healthcare staff wellbeing,
burnout, and patient safety: a systematic review. PloS one, 11(7), p.e0159015.
Hayward, D., Bungay, V., Wolff, A.C. & MacDonald, V., 2016, A qualitative study of
experienced nurses' voluntary turnover: Learning from their perspectives. Journal of
clinical nursing, 25(9-10), pp.1336-1345.
Lamadah, S.M. & Sayed, H.Y., 2014, Challenges facing nursing profession in Saudi
Arabia. Journal of Biology, Agriculture and Healthcare, 4(7), pp.20-25.
MacLean, L., Hassmiller, S., Shaffer, F., Rohrbaugh, K., Collier, T. & Fairman, J., 2014. Scale,
causes, and implications of the primary care nursing shortage. Annual review of
public health, 35, pp.443-457.
Martin, C.J., 2015, The effects of nurse staffing on quality of care. MedSurg Nursing, 24(2),
pp.S4-S4.
Mosadeghrad, A.M., 2014, Factors influencing healthcare service quality. International
journal
of health policy and management, 3(2), p.77.
Wang, C.C., 2016, Closing the gap in nursing education: Comparing nursing registration
systems
in Australia and China. Chinese Nursing Research, 3(1), pp.1-6.