Being a nurse is an important job. It takes commitment and dedication, but the profession is more rewarding than one can imagine. As a nurse, patients depend on you to care for them, the families of these patients depend on you too. They rely on you to give them the best care and to make sure all their needs are met during fragile times in their lives. In today’s society nurses are being over worked and patients are getting the attentive care they require. Assigning one nurse to a dozen patients for one shift. Today’s nurses are putting in the time and its taking a toll on their mental and physical status to the extent of them making mistakes while caring for these patients. The average age of a registered nurse is 45.5 years old (Brimmer).
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The NICU is where premature babies and babies that need special intensive care stay, sometimes for months of their lives. These infants are more susceptible to infections because their lungs haven’t fully developed, their skin is more fragile and a variety of other reasons (Brimmer). Babies, and adults, are in an intensive care unit because they require more specialized care. Every nurse only has two hands and one body. She/he is unable to address more than one patient at a time. It is most critical to have more hands on deck in these units because any one could take a turn for that worst at any …show more content…
In addition, 27 percent have admitted to performing on the job mistakes due to fatigue (Brimmer). The more time a nurse is asked to work over shift puts them at greater risk for fatigue. Not only is this compromising the care of the patient, but the nurses themselves are also at a greater risk for injuries. Research estimates about 440,000 American’s are dying annually from preventable hospital error (Hospital Safety Score). Fatigue tends to make people unfriendly and let’s face it, who wants to be stuck in a hospital bed feeling miserable with a nurse who is just going through the motions and seems to not genuinely care. A study in Pennsylvania showed that for each nurse was designated an average of 5.7 patients in various hospitals across the state (Bates). For each additional patient assigned to a nurse there was an additional infection per 1,000 patients (Bates). This brings us to the conclusion that 4,160 infections could be prevented per year if nurse didn’t have so many patients to care for at one time
The NICU is where premature babies and babies that need special intensive care stay, sometimes for months of their lives. These infants are more susceptible to infections because their lungs haven’t fully developed, their skin is more fragile and a variety of other reasons (Brimmer). Babies, and adults, are in an intensive care unit because they require more specialized care. Every nurse only has two hands and one body. She/he is unable to address more than one patient at a time. It is most critical to have more hands on deck in these units because any one could take a turn for that worst at any …show more content…
In addition, 27 percent have admitted to performing on the job mistakes due to fatigue (Brimmer). The more time a nurse is asked to work over shift puts them at greater risk for fatigue. Not only is this compromising the care of the patient, but the nurses themselves are also at a greater risk for injuries. Research estimates about 440,000 American’s are dying annually from preventable hospital error (Hospital Safety Score). Fatigue tends to make people unfriendly and let’s face it, who wants to be stuck in a hospital bed feeling miserable with a nurse who is just going through the motions and seems to not genuinely care. A study in Pennsylvania showed that for each nurse was designated an average of 5.7 patients in various hospitals across the state (Bates). For each additional patient assigned to a nurse there was an additional infection per 1,000 patients (Bates). This brings us to the conclusion that 4,160 infections could be prevented per year if nurse didn’t have so many patients to care for at one time