The Negative Effects Of The Nursing Shortage In Nursing

Improved Essays
In 1998, a nursing shortage began due to the confluence of several factors that were, at the time, unknown. The lack of nurses is becoming apparent and putting out negative effects for the world to see through the registered nurses habits in caring for these patients. Hospital administrators suggested higher wages and increased training for nurses; however, efforts to provide these did not end the shortage. The controversy here is higher wages cannot make up for being intensely overworked, causing severe exhaustion and job dissatisfaction…but some people are still trying to increase wages without reducing workload. Because many aspects of society are affected, the nursing shortage has become a concern among hospital administrators. Several …show more content…
If the consequences of the nurses’ workloads are affecting the patient care, the dangers of patient survival rates will start to decrease. Insufficient sleep is not only putting the patients in danger, but is also putting the their own lives on the line. Rogers states, “Laboratory studies have shown that moderate levels of prolonged wakefulness can produce performance impairments equivalent to or greater than levels of intoxication deemed unacceptable for driving, working, and/or operating dangerous equipment”(Rogers …show more content…
Before choosing a lifetime career you have to think of all sides. One will never start from the best job available, they must work all the way up and do the worst of the work sometimes. Nurses are beginning to feel unappreciated by the hospital administrators for everything they do on the everyday jobs. Many don’t want to work in extreme overloads, for bare pay and aren’t appreciated for what they do.
In doing research, one tends to find several “causes” for the current nursing shortage, but hospital administrators are still not in agreement regarding any one main cause. Hospitals and researchers have no idea what could be the cause. All that is known is that ”Prolonged shortages also might reduce the quantity of patient care, increase operating and labor costs, and decrease the efficiency and effectiveness of care provided” (Buerhaus et al.). With the cause being unknown, it becomes even harder to keep nurses in the work

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Imagine being a pregnant woman about to give birth and you are in excruciating pain and no nurse can attend you to lead you to a room because there are too many patients coming. If you can’t imagine that, imagine this; you and a family member just got into a horrible car crash and you are on your way to the hospital, but the moment you get there you get placed in a room and get no help from any nurses and you feel your broken bones and see some. This is a problem in the nursing field that sometimes is unavoidable. Many problems occur within the nursing field, such as, under payment, not enough nurses and or male nurses, and not earning the respect they deserve.…

    • 1006 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Nursing Shortage Nursing shortage is beginning to rise as a result of baby boomers retiring, the acuity of patient care admitted to the hospital, and nurses changing their profession as the result of being burnt out. The idea of nursing shortage in the clinical setting, can be associated with the risk of poor quality care rendered to the patient. As the quality of care rendered to the patient declines, the patient becomes at risk for hospital acquired pneumonia, decubitus, and urinary tract infection. Also, the nursing staff will be paid for overtimes and as a result this can affect the budget established by the organization. Insurance companies will not pay for hospital acquired pneumonia, decubitus and urinary tract infection.…

    • 750 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Reference: Allen, L. (January 01, 2008). The nursing shortage continues as faculty shortage grows. Nursing Economics, 26, 1, 35-40. Alspach, G. (2000). Another shortage wake-up call?…

    • 690 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Nurse Wound Care Specialist Preventing Pressure Ulcers Pressure ulcers is an issue that nurses have been trying to solve for years, yet it is still a current issue in long term hospital stays and long term care facilities. Pressure ulcers could better be prevented if facilities had a wound care team to provide skin assessment and management of pressure ulcers. The need in facilities is to have nurses that are responsible for preventing pressure ulcers. Pressure ulcers occur on boney prominences like the sacrum, heels, or scapula’s.…

    • 1313 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Grace Kondourajian Mrs. Klenke English III, Period 4 3 December 2015 Nursing Needs The nurses of every hospital are the glue that keeps things running smoothly and proficiently. Decades have suffered from the shortage of nurses all around the world. The shortage of nurses is an issue that affects almost every branch of health care. USA today addressed the topic with some shocking statistics:…

    • 1369 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Nurses have an integral and important role in the health care system. In the long run, suitable nurse to patient ratios will reduce spending and recruitment and retention of quality nurses will improve. Staffing needs and problems will intensify as the changing need for health care grows in our society. In order to retain nurses and have quality patient care, sufficient nurse to patient ratios must be obtained. Hiring additional staff is an economic issue, however, the outcomes could offset the cost.…

    • 1026 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Safe Staffing in Nursing The American Nurses Association’s State Government Affairs program monitors numerous nursing and healthcare related bills each year. They assess each bill for significance of relation to current healthcare issues and trends (American Nurses Association [ANA], 2015). One of the issues being addressed in 2015 is nurse staffing. This is not a new legislative issue, as it has been reviewed for several years now.…

    • 1775 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Great Essays

    Nursing Shortage In Canada

    • 1246 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Thus, the news of the nursing shortage is often heard and can be seen in the news media. As a nurse back home and a nursing student in Canada, I have been reading, hearing, and experiencing the shortage of nurses in the health care setting. From the past to present, the nursing shortage is discussed as the issue of healthcare globally and nationally. Various factors are associated with the shortage of nurses in the country. I will argue that the international/local migration of nurses, increased number of the population and health care demands, as well as the lack of adequate Registered Nurse (RN) positions, are factors that have contributed to the nursing shortage.…

    • 1246 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Great Essays

    Nursing Shared Governance

    • 1598 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Over the past several years, the demand for nursing staff has increased tremendously. In fact, the nursing shortage in the United States is anticipated to grow to 260,000 by 2025. (Buerhas, Auerbach, & Staiger, 2009). This foreseen shortage in nurses builds off of the knowledge that the average age of nurses is increasing, whilst the demand for nurses increases. More nurses are retiring or are close to retirement and an equal amount of nurses are not being recruited to organizations to take over the jobs of nurses that have left.…

    • 1598 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Introduction Trying to find a theory that can be used and have been used to help with such great problem such as nurse shortage was a challenge. After studying and reading many of the theorist models, Jean Watson nursing model stood out the most. The nurse literature reveals when supporting nurse staffing, it can warrant a quality of care from the nurses for their patients (Douglas, K. 2011). This task for the hospital administrator all the way down to the nurse manager, has come a great challenge and difficult task to achieve.…

    • 1088 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The nursing shortage is a crisis that has been rumored for years. Unfortunately, there are many truths to this rumor and every nurse has been affected by this shortage at some point in their career. Just in recent decades, the economy had led to the nursing shortage. The nursing shortage needs nursing programs and hospital programs to augment and graduate competent registered nurses that can step into the registered nurse role. All nurses need to join and support the American Nurses Association and other nursing groups so that those groups can go in front of our Legislatures, and get Bills passed to mandate overtime so that nurses are not exhausted and can give competent patient care.…

    • 1315 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Nursing Practice Issue Inadequate staffing can be the downfall for any organization and when inadequate staffing effects the healthcare field, the ramifications can affect patients and the nurses caring for them with negative ramifications. Nurses face dilemmas such as patient safety, patient satisfaction, nurse burnout, as well as a decrease in job satisfaction. These dilemmas can be attributed to inadequate staffing of facilities.…

    • 990 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Essay On Nursing Shortage

    • 2146 Words
    • 9 Pages

    Within the next ten years, more than one million registered nurses in the United States will be eligible for retirement. This will potentially leave the nursing profession with the largest shortage in history. The need for health care is only growing due to the aging baby boomer population. “Nursing researchers have noted that the projected nursing shortage, if not rectified, is expected to affect health care cost, job satisfaction and quality patient care” (Lartey, 2014, p. 1027). Without an adequate number of nurses’ patient safety is at risk, resulting in medical errors due to understaffing.…

    • 2146 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Even though each nursing shortage is unique, their reasons for why they occurred and the strategies used to address them are strikingly similar (Whelan,…

    • 2272 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Great Essays

    Introduction Nursing is a dynamic profession of providing care for infirm and sick individuals. This profession exists due to the demands of society. One major problem society is facing today is a shortage of nurses. Lois Berry and Paul Curry (2012) state, “by the year 2022, there will be a need of 60 000 full time registered nurses (p.35). Berry and Curry note that the number of nurses will decrease by 2022.…

    • 1017 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Great Essays

Related Topics