Layoffs In Hospitals Affect Patient Care
Layoffs in Hospitals can affect patients care.
Teresa Carlos
COMM/215
August 26, 2013
Layoffs in Hospitals can affect patient care.
Today’s expanded healthcare environment requires nurses to provide high quality care to achieve best patient outcomes and satisfaction, but also the healthcare system is required to reduce costs provided on healthcare at the same time. One of the ways to reduce cost in hospitals is to layoff the personnel; RN’s, LPN’s, UAP’s, and transporters. “Nurses are experiencing higher workloads than ever before due to (…) reduced staffing and increased overtime” (Carayon & Gurses, 2008, p.1), and that may negatively lead to issues with patient safety and nursing job satisfaction.
“The healthcare sector saw the …show more content…
When the nurse is frequently overworked and under time pressure the nurse may not have time to follow rules and guidelines for safe care “High workload in the form of time pressure may reduce the attention devoted by a nurse to safety-critical tasks, thus creating conditions for errors and unsafe patient care” (Carayon & Gurses, 2008, p. 4). There is strong evidence in the literature that nurse staffing levels significantly affect several nursing-sensitive patient outcomes. According to Carayon & Gurses several studies found a significant relation between lower nurse staffing and higher rates of pneumonia among surgical patients. Some evidence exists regarding the impact of nurse staffing levels on failure to rescue and mortality “In a study of 168 nonfederal adult general hospitals in Pennsylvania, Aiken and colleagues found that each additional patient per nurse was associated with a 7 percent increase in the likelihood of mortality within 30 days of admission and in the likelihood of failure to rescue” (Carayon & Gurses, 2008, p. 3). According to Pekarsky layoffs in hospitals may result in lowering patient care and the patients are going to end up suffering for it. They are going to have less nurses that will be taking care of more patients and the patients are going to get less care (Pekarsky, May
Teresa Carlos
COMM/215
August 26, 2013
Layoffs in Hospitals can affect patient care.
Today’s expanded healthcare environment requires nurses to provide high quality care to achieve best patient outcomes and satisfaction, but also the healthcare system is required to reduce costs provided on healthcare at the same time. One of the ways to reduce cost in hospitals is to layoff the personnel; RN’s, LPN’s, UAP’s, and transporters. “Nurses are experiencing higher workloads than ever before due to (…) reduced staffing and increased overtime” (Carayon & Gurses, 2008, p.1), and that may negatively lead to issues with patient safety and nursing job satisfaction.
“The healthcare sector saw the …show more content…
When the nurse is frequently overworked and under time pressure the nurse may not have time to follow rules and guidelines for safe care “High workload in the form of time pressure may reduce the attention devoted by a nurse to safety-critical tasks, thus creating conditions for errors and unsafe patient care” (Carayon & Gurses, 2008, p. 4). There is strong evidence in the literature that nurse staffing levels significantly affect several nursing-sensitive patient outcomes. According to Carayon & Gurses several studies found a significant relation between lower nurse staffing and higher rates of pneumonia among surgical patients. Some evidence exists regarding the impact of nurse staffing levels on failure to rescue and mortality “In a study of 168 nonfederal adult general hospitals in Pennsylvania, Aiken and colleagues found that each additional patient per nurse was associated with a 7 percent increase in the likelihood of mortality within 30 days of admission and in the likelihood of failure to rescue” (Carayon & Gurses, 2008, p. 3). According to Pekarsky layoffs in hospitals may result in lowering patient care and the patients are going to end up suffering for it. They are going to have less nurses that will be taking care of more patients and the patients are going to get less care (Pekarsky, May