Introduction
The nursing profession has experienced unendurable nursing shortage over the last years. Shortage of nurse does not only compromise the quality of patients’ health care but also has detrimental effects on the nurses themselves due to high patient-to –nurse ratios. For instance, the shortage of nurses leads to job burnout due to increased workloads and frustrations among the nursing staff. In addition, nursing the shortage leads to increased workloads and longer working hours that are the main cause of job dissatisfaction that eventually increases the turnover of nurse (Wyte-Lake et al., 2013). The purpose of this paper is to analyze the causes of the nursing shortage, the consequences of nursing the shortage to the health care system and highlight possible solutions in addressing the shortage of nurses.
The reasons for the continued increase in the shortage of nurse is multifaceted that involves changes in scopes such as employment patterns, population demographics, nursing work and health care systems (Wyte-Lake et al., 2013).The aforementioned scopes coupled together affect the recruitment of nurses as well as the retaining of existing nurses has resulted to an increase in the shortage of nurse. For, instance, the continued rise in population growth results to an increased demand for health care service. This makes it difficult for the health care system to adequately meet demand for health care due to a high nurse-to-patient ratio. The second reason for the increase in nursing shortage is the diminishing pipeline of nursing students due to the diversity in career options. This makes it difficult for the health care system to outsource for new nurses to fill vacancies left by retiring nurses and nurses who chose to leave the profession. In addition, the image created mainly by the media about the shortfall of nurses and stressful nursing experiences discourages many young people from pursuing nursing careers. Poor working conditions such as incidences of bullying lead to job dissatisfaction and stress that are the main contributors for the nursing shortage.
As such, low nurse staffing has adverse effects on the quality of health care to patients and patients’ outcomes. For instance, extended working hours among the nursing staff is linked to the occurrence of medical errors thus affecting the patients’ outcome. On the other hand, long working hours leads to burnout of the nurses, and this increases the rate of health care infection and mortality rates due medical errors (Toh and Devi, 2012).Therefore, it is imperative that health care leaders should address the working environment of nurses aimed at improving patient safety by ensuring quality health care to patients. One of the solutions in addressing the shortage of nurse is the retention of nurses. Thus, nursing leaders should come up with new methods for valuing nurses. For instance, nursing leaders should incorporate nurses in the formulation of policies and decision-making processes. This enables nursing leaders to learn elements that satisfy the members of staff and devise ways of satisfying the nurses. The other method of addressing the issue is recruitment of nurses so as to ensure adequate nursing ratios. In addition, leaders in the health care industry should devise strategies to encourage the enrollment of students in nursing careers. For instance, through the subsidization of training and creating a positive image about the nursing profession especially through the media. Thus in order to address the shortage of nurses’ collaborative efforts should be made among health care executives, nursing leaders, policy makers and the media so as to ensure quality health care and safe working environments for the nurse (Nevidjon and Erickson, 2006).Therefore, in my opinion the shortage of nurses is not limited to the United States but it’s a global problem that should be thoroughly addressed so as to improve the quality of health care.
The article provides invaluable insights regarding the nursing shortage. It thoroughly explains the cause of the apparent nursing shortage, implications of the shortage on the entire healthcare system and provides feasible solutions to the problem. For the purposes of accuracy and precision, the article alludes to similar studies that have been done by other experts within the healthcare system. Convincingly, the article can be termed as exhaustive and thorough.
References
Nevidjon, B., & Erickson, J. I. (2006). The Nursing Shortage: Solutions for the Short and Long Term. A History of Nursing Ideas, 461.
Toh, S. G., Ang, E., & Devi, M. K. (2012). Systematic review on the relationship between the nursing shortage and job satisfaction, stress and burnout levels among nurses in oncology/haematology settings. International Journal of Evidence‐Based Healthcare, 10(2), 126-141.
Wyte-Lake, T., Tran, K., Bowman, C. C., Needleman, J., & Dobalian, A. (2013). A systematic review of strategies to address the clinical nursing faculty shortage. The Journal of nursing education, 52(5), 245-252.
