Impact of Competing Needs
The responsibility of caring for patients always falls on the shoulders of the nurses. However, there are often many hindrances that lead to them offering low-quality healthcare services to the patients. One of the significant nursing issues that lead to this poor quality nursing is inadequate staffing since it leads to overworking of the nurses as they are assigned more patients than they can manage. Moreover, there are policies that have been developed nationwide to overcome the issue of understaffing of nurses so as to improve the quality of healthcare.
Inadequate staffing of nurses is classified as one of the main issues affecting nursing quality in the country and even globally. It usually occurs due to the aging of the population, an aging workforce, and a limited supply of new nurses. As a result, the number of nurses retiring is higher than the number of recruits while there are more older people lining up for care. This presents a situation that is not ideal, and therefore, to raise the quality of nurses, solutions had to be found.
In an attempt to improve the quality of nursing, policies have been brought up to curb the issue of understaffing. These policies are aimed at the recruitment of new nurses and the retention of existing nurses, which in turn results in better quality nursing. The strategies involve reducing overtime, adopting a nurse residency program, rewarding longevity, and recruiting graduates from universities. Additionally, the existent nurses would be involved in the training of the recruits. The application of these policies leads to the eradication of insufficient staffing, but it is will different effects on the nurses, resources, and patients.
Competing needs include the needs of the workforce, resources, and patients. They show that there is a conflict between the availability of hospital resources, the needs of the nurses, and the strategy meant to solve the issue of inadequate staff. The hospital resources would be depleted due to the additional costs that would result from establishing nurse residents. Moreover, the recruitment of graduates would also demand resources for training which would increase running costs.
Many patients often prefer to be handled by more qualified and mature professionals, therefore, increasing the number of new recruit nurses would clash with most patients’ needs as the recruits would be tasked with handling most patients. Additionally, the involvement of existing nurses in training recruits will increase the workload of the older nurses, which could cause exhaustion and, thus, might lead to the negligence of their own patients.
Inadequate staffing in hospitals is a problem that has to be solved in order to regain quality healthcare. However, attempts to rectify and curb the issue leads to solutions that are in conflict with the needs of the nurses, patients, and hospital resources. Therefore, curbing the problem of understaffing gives rise to newer issues that will still lower the quality of healthcare. The competing needs also need to be resolved in order to ensure good quality nursing. Thus, competing needs must also be taken into consideration when handling issues of inadequate staffing in hospitals.
References
Buchan, J. (2005). A certain ratio? The policy implications of minimum staffing ratios in nursing. Journal of Health Services Research & Policy, 10(4), 239-244.
Courtney, M., & Moulding, N. T. (2014). Beyond balancing competing needs: embedding involuntary treatment within a recovery approach to mental health social work. Australian Social Work, 67(2), 214-226.
Home, A. N. A., & Policy, N. I. The Nursing Shortage: Solutions for the Short and Long Term.