The economic downturn of the 1990s created a need for more cost effective health care practices in Canada. Baumann & Blythe (2003) observed that during this time, reducing expenses became the focus for governments and institutions, and the majority of hospitals used a bookkeeping method of restructuring (p. 1566). Thus, the easy option of reducing human resources, the largest expenditure in running health care institutions, was taken without carefully planning and considering indirect or long-term outcomes (Baumann & Blythe, 2003, p. 1566). This resulted in many cuts to the nursing workforce, the largest group of health care professionals (for example, the number of registered nurses in Ontario dropped by 8000 from 1995 to 1998) (Baumann &
…show more content…
In addition to the stressful nature of the job, the heavy workloads created by low nurse staffing levels and poor work environments strain nurses’ resources and make nurses more susceptible to burnout, injury, disability, and illness, which all contribute to nurse absenteeism. Nurse absenteeism creates worker compensation and replacement costs, and according to the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions, the cost of Canadian nurse absenteeism in 2010 was $711 million (as cited in Berry & Curry, 2012, p.37). This is a significant amount of resources that could be allocated more efficiently to improve nurse staffing and reduce workload, which could counterbalance the labour costs by decreasing resources spent on absenteeism and improving the productivity of nurses. Another source of expenses is nurse turnover, caused by factors such as job dissatisfaction and burnout and aggravated by insufficient nurse staffing and poor working conditions. A pan-Canada study by O’Brien Pallas et al. (2010) reported that the mean turnover rate was at 19.9% for nurses working in Canadian hospitals and that turnover had a correlation with increased chance of medical errors (p. 1073). Nurse turnover is costly to hospitals as an American study by Jones (2005) calculated that turnover could cost as much as 1.3 times the salary of the quitting nurse due to expenses involved with nurse vacancy, recruiting, hiring, and training of a new nurse, and decreased productivity of the new nurse and the affected coworkers (p. 43-46). Furthermore, turnover is a concern due to the nursing shortage Canada faces with an aging nursing workforce and increasing population, making nurse retention important for health care institutions. Therefore, adequate nurse staffing levels would help improve nurse retention, diminish the probability of medical error, and
In addition to the stressful nature of the job, the heavy workloads created by low nurse staffing levels and poor work environments strain nurses’ resources and make nurses more susceptible to burnout, injury, disability, and illness, which all contribute to nurse absenteeism. Nurse absenteeism creates worker compensation and replacement costs, and according to the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions, the cost of Canadian nurse absenteeism in 2010 was $711 million (as cited in Berry & Curry, 2012, p.37). This is a significant amount of resources that could be allocated more efficiently to improve nurse staffing and reduce workload, which could counterbalance the labour costs by decreasing resources spent on absenteeism and improving the productivity of nurses. Another source of expenses is nurse turnover, caused by factors such as job dissatisfaction and burnout and aggravated by insufficient nurse staffing and poor working conditions. A pan-Canada study by O’Brien Pallas et al. (2010) reported that the mean turnover rate was at 19.9% for nurses working in Canadian hospitals and that turnover had a correlation with increased chance of medical errors (p. 1073). Nurse turnover is costly to hospitals as an American study by Jones (2005) calculated that turnover could cost as much as 1.3 times the salary of the quitting nurse due to expenses involved with nurse vacancy, recruiting, hiring, and training of a new nurse, and decreased productivity of the new nurse and the affected coworkers (p. 43-46). Furthermore, turnover is a concern due to the nursing shortage Canada faces with an aging nursing workforce and increasing population, making nurse retention important for health care institutions. Therefore, adequate nurse staffing levels would help improve nurse retention, diminish the probability of medical error, and