Low Nurse To Patient Ratio Essay

Over many years, the nursing team has faced countless complications, physically and mentally, in the work setting. The basis of these complications arises from a low nurse-to-patient ratio. The typical ratio of one nurse to a multitude of patients has been proven to be detrimental to the nurse and patient. It can be harmful to the nurse by inflicting stress on himself or herself and to the patient by being subject to poor care that is given by the nurse. With a miniscule amount of nurses assigned to a multitude of patients, problems in health and within the work setting will always be abundant. For this reason, it should have an increase in the number of nurses assigned per patient as it can improve the quality of care, shorten shift lengths, create a more stable environment for nurses, and create multiple risk management within the hospital. Whenever there is a deprivation of nurses to patients, one can nearly expect the quality of care that the nurse is giving to the patient to be harmful. When there is a low nurse-to-patient ratio, the quality of care often decreases. This can often dissatisfy the patient receiving care, produce countless complications, and also create many morbidity risks. A low nurse to patient ratio is the fulcrum of all problems that may occur when there are little to no nurses assigned to a …show more content…
As shift lengths increased, also did the odds of burnout, job dissatisfaction, and intention to leave the job. The odds of burnout and job dissatisfaction were two and a half times greater for nurses working prolonged shifts than for nurses who worked shifts of 8-9 hours. The odds of burnout and job dissatisfaction persisted even after altering the confounding factors. However, when there were higher proportions of nurses working shorter shifts, 8-9 hours or 10-11 hours, it resulted in decreases in patient dissatisfaction (Needleman et al.,