Running head: NURSING SHORTAGE
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NURSING SHORTAGE
Nursing Burnout
Brianne Lee
The role of nurses in health care is irreplaceable. From collaborating with interdisciplinary teams to providing quality evidence-based practice care to educating about health promotion and psychosocial such as health education, counseling and referral, and health assessments nurses make up the foundation of the healthcare system. Therefore, nurses play an essential role in health care and should represent a significant healthcare worker population in a setup (Muabbar & Alsharqi, 2021). The nursing shortage is the decrease in the number of nurses in the patient population. The nursing workforce shortage is a global challenge that is associated with poor nursing outcomes.
With the increase in hospitalized patients across the world due to the COVID 19, the healthcare system has carried the mo
The patient’s turns up during the COVID 19 period in our organization has been increasing daily. There has been a high number of inpatients due to the COVID 19 disease and other severe acute diseases and emergencies. The low number of nursing professionals has led to inefficiency in care provision due to nurses’ burnout. Generally, the low number of health workers has proven a challenge in care role distribution. Saudi Arabia has also been facing a profound shortage in the healthcare workforce, especially nurses (Muabbar & Alsharqi, 2021). Poor nursing outcomes in Saudi Arabia have been associated with nursing professionals’ inadequacy. Without adequate nursing staff, us nurses are forced to work in unsafe work environments with dangerous patient loads. workforce leads to good health outcomes and patient satisfaction.
The nursing shortage in some countries is due to a limited number of training institutions, poor healthcare workforce distribution, and excessive reliance on the expatriate workforce. Haddad et al. (2021) observe that the shortage may be due to a lack of educators, poor workforce distribution, an aging workforce, and nursing turnover due to burnout. Health setups with a higher patient-to-nurse ratio report high mortality and morbidity rates due to the inability to meet the demand. Good nursing care will decrease mortality rate, hospital infections, and the length of hospital stay.
Nursing shortage can result from a variety of factors in various countries. The most common causes of nursing shortage include poor working conditions, poor management, reduced university students’ intake for nursing courses, and competition for skilled workers (Shamsi & Peyravi, 2020). Iran’s workforce shortage is due to immigration, work-related injuries, increased hospital bed, early retirement, and low social status (Shamsi & Peyravi, 2020). These challenges can be attributed to government insufficiency in balancing the supply and demand in the community. This global challenge in nursing requires unique strategies to end the crisis.
Strategies for the intervention of nursing shortage may require both organizational and
national considerations. The management may introduce electronic medical records and other technological interventions to reduce direct nurse-patient contacts (Haddad et al., 2020). Electronic appliances will help reduce burnout and ease the flow of data and the safety of patients’ records in the hospital. Removing nurses from the areas of patient care maximizes service delivery. For instance, the nurse does not have to collect a patient’s sample from the laboratory; instead, the results can be sent through a computer. The electronic intervention also minimizes movement in the hospital, leading to workforce utilization.
Organizations should consider nurses’ empowerment by providing a safe and comfortable working environment. Nurses should have the autonomy in making staffing ratio decisions based on abilities and efficiency and the volume of roles. Empowerment is a tool to reduce burnout and the desire for nurses to leave the workforce (Haddad et al., 2020). Some organizations have implemented improved nursing processes, high safety, quality, and patient satisfaction. A safe and conducive working environment motivates the nurses to keep working and deliver quality /services. Decreased nursing errors and patient satisfaction are factors to retain nurse rate.
Some strategies may need government intervention in solving the nursing shortage crisis. The government should review policies and programs for the recruitment of the nursing workforce. It should also consider salary increments for nurses compared to other professions to increase the willingness to enter and stay in the profession (Haddad et al., 2020). The education system should also be reviewed for high-quality nursing, proper planning for recruiting nurses, and increased admissions and nursing education (Einhellig, 2020). However, internal interventions are associated with the organizational system of a health setup. These are factors such as support in the workplace and improving the working environment.
The government and organizations should create a positive view of nursing. A positive image will encourage medical students to join nursing programs and federal and state agencies. The United States offers financial incentives to increase the registered nurses’ program registration (Samuel & Oliver, 2021). However, the range of salaries in some nations varies depending on years of service, qualifications, and roles and duties of an individual. Combating the nursing shortage requires multifaceted strategies and a lot of commitment from every unit involved. Satisfactory nursing services improve the quality of life and patients’ trust and satisfaction with healthcare.
Improving the working conditions of our organization and proper delegation of duties will encourage the existing nurses to stay. However, there is a need for recruiting additional nurses to minimize the ratio of patient to nurse. This will reduce burnout and improve the quality of the services offered. The management should also install electrical appliances to reduce the need for nurses in inpatient areas. Empowerment programs will also motivate the nurses and increase the retention rate. These interventions are likely to minimize the problem of nurse shortage in our organization.
References
Einhellig, K. (2020). Addressing the Global Nursing Shortage: An International Collaboration. International Journal of Nursing, 7(2), 87-91.
Haddad, L. M., Annamaraju, P., & Toney-Butler, T. J. (2020). Nursing shortage. StatPearls. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK493175/
Muabbar, H., & Alsharqi, O. (2021). The impact of short-term solutions of nursing shortage on nursing outcome, nurse perceived quality of care, and patient safety. American Journal of Nursing Research, 9(2), 35-44.
Samuel, B., & Oliver, N. (2021). The US nursing shortage: opportunity to close the gap. https://www.consultant360.com/article/consultant360/us-nursing-shortage-opportunity-close-gap
Shamsi, A., & Peyravi, H. (2020). Nursing shortage, a different challenge in Iran: A systematic review. Medical journal of the Islamic Republic of Iran, 34, 8.
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