Do Nurses Workload Affect Her Ability To Care For Her Patients?

Does a Nurses Workload Affect Her Ability to Care for Her Patients? Nurses are one of the most important people regarding a patient’s health in a hospital or home care setting. The nurse is the messenger that relates critical information to the doctor concerning changes in the patients’ health status. In order to report proper and accurate information to the health care provider, the nurse must properly do her job and complete all of the tasks assigned to her. The RN or LPN has a large amount of work to complete for each patient. For instance, the nurse must assess the patient regularly to report any changes in their health status. She must also provide physical care such as administering medication, changing a dressing, or assisting the patient
However, the question still remains what is considered to be a safe workload for a nurse with sick patients? According to Jenny Kay a former director of nursing and a nurse of thirty years who is now a part of the National Nursing Research unit “…if a nurse on a general medical or surgical ward is asked to care for more than 8 patients on day duty, this should be reported as a clinical incident.” (Kay, 2013) Many nurses work short staffed due to improper scheduling, other nurses calling in sick, or a lack of employees. Therefore, in many instances, nurses are responsible for 10 to 15 patients at a time or possibly more depending on the quantity of patient in their particular facility. This increased workload may not be an issue if the patients do not require a lot of the nurse’s attention, However, a nurse that is taking care of patients that are critically ill, such as patient on life support or a patient that require substantial amounts of the nurse’s time, should have fewer patients because of the demanding need of her patients. Nonetheless, nurses that work in the ER or ICU still face the same understaff issues that other nurses are