A major concern in healthcare today is the nursing shortage, which promises to get worse as the number of people choosing this profession declines while demand for their services continues to grow.
During my career as a registered nurse, I experienced the lifestyle of these caregivers. While nursing is very rewarding, it comes with struggles: long hours, unexpected overtime, and erratic schedules. This can make nurses' lives emotionally and physically draining.
If we could normalize nursing schedules, not only could we make their lives a little less stressful, we could maximize staffing efficiency for providers, lower their personnel costs, and perhaps contribute to the long-term viability of this important profession.
Here are some of the steps to take to improve conditions for nurses:
Don't let scheduling be an afterthought. Make sure there is a structure in place so that administrative scheduling doesn't fall on nurses who should be providing care. Be ready for last-minute changes and have a system in place so that everyone knows what to expect.
Provide staff schedules in advance. Scheduling problems can make it challenging for nurses to manage family commitments and maintain a satisfying quality of life. Nurses often work long hours and inconsistent shifts, leading to burnout, fatigue, and health problems. Some are given their schedules just two weeks in advance and are frequently asked to work overtime shifts without notice, which makes it hard for them to take care of the day-to-day activities we all take for granted. Hospitals that offer nurses regular schedules, months in advance, will be more successful at recruiting and retaining them. This gives a hospital the upper hand in an industry where there is a shortage of talent and constant competition for the best.
Increase continuity of care. Continuity of care, when nurses provide care for a patient for consecutive days, allows nurses to get to know their patients, their conditions, and their treatment plans much better than if they are assigned to a different patient every day. This can improve patient safety and patient satisfaction. An efficient staff-scheduling process can have a major effect on the ability to provide maximum continuity of care.
Every healthcare organization should step back and evaluate the scheduling process for nurses. While this may seem like a small issue on the surface, it can have a serious effect on a company's bottom line. The largest expenditure for a hospital is its nurses. While it is expected that the nursing staff will naturally have some overtime, approximately 2%-3% of the budget, most hospitals are experiencing unnecessarily high overtime, around 6%-8% of the budget. By harnessing this overspending, a hospital can save a significant amount of money, and free funds to be reinvested into patient care, equipment to improve overall care and efficiency, or other strategic projects.
The potential to provide a safer patient experience is reason enough to pursue the goal of a more balanced scheduling approach, but the additional opportunity to take care of precious and scarce human and financial resources drives the issue to the forefront. We have an opportunity to make a very positive impact on all involved by managing our staff scheduling process better.
Karla Schnell is a consultant with North Highland and works with major national providers throughout the United States. She began her career as a nurse in Canada more than 20 years ago and quickly moved up the ranks to become one of the youngest nursing directors in the Province.For information on how you can contribute to HealthLeaders Media online, please read our Editorial Guidelines.
With two days to go before a planned strike, the Minnesota Nurses Association is going public with stories of alleged poor patient care to back its assertion that hospitals are dangerously understaffed. The union, which says hospital staffing is at the core of its dispute with management, has scheduled a news conference to tell some of those stories. "We don't think the general public truly understands just how unsafe things are inside our hospitals, and that it's getting worse," said Cindy Olson, a member of the nurses' negotiating team.
A nurses strike seemed all but inevitable after talks broke down between the Minnesota Nurses Association and 14 hospitals, with each side blaming the other for refusing to compromise. Before the afternoon was out, the nurses and hospitals were shifting gears to prepare for the scheduled one-day walkout, which would start at 7 a.m. June 10. Hospital officials are vowing to operate as normally as possible, saying they hope to keep patient disruption to a minimum with the help of thousands of replacement nurses, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports.
More than 12,000 nurses in California are set to hold a one-day walkout June 10, taking part in what could be the largest registered nursing strike in the country's history. The nurses plan to walk off their jobs at five University of California hospitals—San Francisco, Davis, Los Angeles, Irvine and San Diego—and three hospitals in Los Angeles County. Nurses from the same union in Minnesota are also planning to strike that day, bringing the number of striking nurses nationwide to more than 24,000.
Nearly 2,400 nurses from other states have flooded the Minnesota nursing board with license applications in the last month, 10 times the normal volume, as hospitals line up replacements for a possible strike June 10. The 14 hospitals have said they're preparing to stay open if a walkout occurs, and staffing agencies are offering as much as $2,200 a day to recruit temporary replacement nurses. Already, some elective procedures are being postponed, and some doctors are starting to field questions from patients about what to expect if a strike occurs.
A union representing 13,000 nurses at nine Southern California hospitals announced that they intend to strike June 10 if they do not reach agreement with hospital officials on their contracts. The strike would include nurses from all University of California hospitals, Citrus Valley Medical Center in Covina, San Pedro Peninsula Hospital, and Olympia Medical Center in Los Angeles, said Jill Furillo, a nurse and bargaining director for National Nurses United, which includes the California Nurses Assn. union. Furillo said contract negotiations stalled because of hospital officials' unwillingness to adhere to state-mandated nurse staffing ratios, particularly during nurses' meals and breaks.