Various researches have been carried out in order to be able to address the issue of nursing shortages as a cause of an unhealthy working environment for the nurses and this then reciprocates in harmful effects on the patients as a whole. In this paper, I will critically analyze the research that was carried out by Leslie Vaughan and Trisha Slinger was aimed at ensuring that the issue of shortage of nurses is addressed and able to provide the solutions that may enable the institution, government, and the society as a large(Vaughan and Slinger, 2012).
With this research, it is clear that if the members of the society have a better understanding of this issue, it will enable reduce the stress and fatigue levels amongst the nurses and with this they will be able to adequately provide the patients with the desired levels of care which will then reciprocate in the betterment of the patients’ health. This is due to the fact that in the instance that the patients visit the hospital or clinic and the nurse to patient ratio is not as per the desired levels, the attention that they would be given in some instances may tend not to be efficient to adequately tackle the patient’s problem (Kramer and Schmalenberg, 2008).
The research team was able to adequately show that the fact that the shortage of the nurses in the institutions will lead to various effects on the side of both the patients and further the staff. Due to the shortage, the patients may be affected due to the lack of adequate and required care which results to the patients’ worsening (Vaughan and Slinger, 2012). On the other hand, the individuals in the hospital will tend to lack team work due to them always being occupied and having them unable to be able to attend the various team building activities.
Lastly, the team was able to bring the issue of Nursing Resource Team which is defined as a team that is tasked with the functions of ensuring that the task force that attends to the patients. These nurses may be both full time and part time nurses who may possess various skills and knowledge that will be vital in handling the patients effectively.
Purpose and Research Questions
This research was carried out in order to show the problems that the NRT face as they visit the hospitals to offer the help in a bid to address the issue of the shortage of nurses. From the research, it was clear that they are disgusted when they go to the institutions which they consider to be unhealthy environments (Vaughan and Slinger, 2012). This is clear when the nurses are of the opinion that when they visit a particular hospital the day will be shattered or be a good day.
The research was meant to answer various questions. Some of these questions were,
What is considered to be an unhealthy environment?
Does the unhealthy environment affect the patients?
How an unhealthy environment affects the members of the NRT and the nurses as a whole?
What are the various steps that may be taken in order to ensure the hospital’s environment is favorable for the medical personnel to work effectively?
Lastly, the research questions would be answered effectively with the use of qualitative methods since by considering the quality of the output of the personnel, the researchers were able to consider the effects of the environment on the personnel.
Literature review
However, the downside of the author’s choice of the peer-reviewed articles is not current. The latest of the peer-reviews is the Maiden article which was published in 2010. With this downside, one may think that whatever has been written in the articles may be outdated and hence not able to be used in our society as at now, but the truth of the matter’s that the peer-reviews are still applicable in determining the importance of the healthy working environment. In addition to this, the research articles were able to give the various ways of measuring the success of nurses. As per the research, it was realized that the best way of determining the success of the personnel is by determining the way the patients outcomes when they leave the hospital, whether they are better or they ended up being worse (Vaughan and Slinger, 2012).
Lastly, the author did not adequately indicate the weaknesses of the studies pertaining to the issue of a healthy working environment. However, the articles that he cited were adequate to build a good argument and strong argument due to him providing the facts and research findings out of the survey.
Theoretical Framework
Reference
Slinger, L. V. (2012). Building a Healthy Work Environment: A nursing Resources Team Perspective. London Health Sciences Centre, 71-76
American Association of Critical-Care Nurses. (2005). AACN standards for establishing and sustaining healthy work environments: a journey to excellence. American Journal of Critical Care, 14(3), 187-197.
Kramer, M., & Schmalenberg, C. (2008). Confirmation of a healthy work environment. Critical Care Nurse, 28(2), 56-63.
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