Studies found that the more patients assigned to a nurse, the higher the risk of mortality for injuries, illnesses, complications, falls, failure-to-rescue rates and hospital readmission and the longer their hospital stay, according to Alexandra Robbins’ recent article The New York Times. Nursing facilities are central to patient care. Today, healthcare in hospitals is taking on greater significance because the rise in patient acuity demands intensive nursing care. At the same time, a rapidly evolving healthcare climate, increasing cost-containing pressures and growing rates of disease severity and patient comorbidity make it imperative for hospitals to explore creative ways of redeveloping treatment without sacrificing quality.

Hospital payment is efficiency dependent. When a hospital does not have enough qualified personnel to offer the treatment patients need based on their degree of acuity, reimbursement may be dramatically affected. Nurse coordinators usually employ the oncology unit on which a nurse works in accordance with their patient acuity level. Normally, they will staff down at about 3 p.m. because they have released their discharged patients and their rates of acuity aren’t as high; however, there are days that they can’t. When units have higher turnover rates, including admissions, discharges and transitions, while considering staffing requirements and nurse-to – patient ratios, extra nursing time is not acknowledged in shift variation.

The incidence and cost of medication errors remains an issue due to understaffing of nurses. A variety of technology approaches have been introduced to minimize the number of medication errors, including computerized prescription order entry, automated medication administration records and barcoding administration; but errors tend to occur even with the use of these technologies. Health care leaders need to consider not only investments in technology capital but also human resources as a strategy to keep patients safe. This research looked at the relationship between nurse staffing and medication errors. Findings indicate that even a small number of employed licensed vocational nurses may lead to medication errors.

To assess the adequacy of nursing staff in hospitals and nursing homes, the Committee evaluated first of all the overall availability of nursing staff in light of increasing demand for their services and the factors affecting demand. Continuing current trends towards lower hospitalization levels coupled with increased acuity of hospitalized patients and the resulting transfer in jobs to outpatient and community care settings may have major consequences for the use of nurses in hospital settings, as well as for their training. In the future, they will be increasingly called upon to fill positions requiring expanded professional judgment, management of complex systems spanning conventional service setting boundaries, and enhanced medical autonomy.

Similarly, not all nursing homes today are single-focus facilities that take care of chronically ill patients, who often need custodial care. They are becoming increasingly the “patient” replacement for most of the under acute treatment that was historically part of a hospital stay. Due to the shortened length of hospital stays nursing homes are attempting to offer transitional medical facilities that would have been offered in the past in the clinical environment of acute care.

All of these factors pose critical questions about the adequacy of registered nurses in terms of training potential nurses for education. In addressing this problem, many researchers conclude that aggregate numbers are adequate to meet national needs, at least for the immediate future, but that the educational mix may not be appropriate to satisfy either current or potential demands of a rapidly evolving health care system. There is a strong need to determine the adequacy of the workforce for the future in terms both of numbers and expertise and skills. In the sense of a rapidly evolving health care environment, these changes take on increased significance and urgency, putting tremendous stress on the environment as it seeks to keep down spending while at the same time increasing access and ensuring quality of health care.

Communication between the nurse of the patient and the nurse in charge is crucial in order to ensure that the unit has the tools available to provide outstanding patient care. Education, coordination, and planning are obviously essential to every health-care organization’s success. Nursing facilities are central to patient care. Today, healthcare in hospitals is taking on greater significance because the rise in patient acuity demands intensive nursing care.

FCNS is a First Call Medical Staffing serving both northern and southern California. They are the premiere first call staffing providing nurses and allied health professionals to multiple healthcare facilities in the area. FCNS is a provider of first call medical solutions that are essentials to hospitals, clinics, long term care facilities, and so much more. FCNS specializes in on call staffing, one call nursing agency, and all medical staffing upon request from healthcare facilities.