NURS 3100 Week 3 Assignment 1 – Impact of Nurses On Health Care Quality
Trends and Issues in nursing are a large, all-encompassing topic. It encompasses anything from poor patient outcomes, Magnet status, nurse-to-patient ratios, and medication errors to quality of care, etc. Throughout this paper, I will describe one topic in particular that can have a large impact on the quality of patient care and the outcomes those patients face. Nurse-to-patient ratios have been a long-standing issue nurses have had to work through. The purpose of this paper is to describe how nursing shortages can affect quality patient care and what Magnet status can do to help improve those ratios and patient care in general. Do you need urgent assignment help ? Get in touch with us at eminencepapers.com.
According to a longitudinal study done by BMC Health Services Research on nurse staffing ratios and patient outcomes, in order to have high-quality patient care, it is imperative to 1. be adequately staffed and 2. for that staff to be sufficiently educated and allowed to practice within their scope of practice (Chau et al. BMC Health Services Research (2015). Staffing has been widely researched, and a direct correlation has been found between positive patient outcomes and adequate staffing. The article goes on to reference a study that researched approximately 168 hospitals across the United States and concluded that adding just one more patient per nurse increased the “risk-adjusted 30-day inpatient mortality and failure-to-rescue rate” (Chau et al. BMC Health Services Research (2015). That is quite significant of a finding. By adding just one more patient per nurse, we run the risk of hindering patient outcomes. As someone who works in a high-volume area with critical patients, I can attest to the fact that there have been nights when I am stuck caring for 7-8 plus patients with three or more being considered “critical.” We have continued to have a high rate of burnout and turnover as the administration has yet to find a favorable nursing environment that fosters high-quality patient care at the same time as practicing safe nurse-to-patient ratios. This leads to my next topic, Magnet status, and how that achievement has improved patient outcomes and overall higher-quality patient care.
According to the ANA, as part of obtaining Magnet status, an organization must have excellence in nursing empowerment. By empowering our nurses, that turnover rate beings to decrease and disappear altogether. My hospital has such high burnout and turnover rates, especially in the ER and ICC, where nurses are given high-acuity patients and, to our downfall, too many high-acuity level patients. To do better for our patients and have those decreasing levels of burnout and turnover, we must look to Magnet standards for improvement. Those improvements are up to nurses like you and me. To further our education so we can go back to establishments and help bring about these changes.
NURS 3100 Week 3 Assignment 1 – Impact of Nurses On Health Care Quality
In conclusion, the correlation between good patient outcomes, high-quality patient care, nursing excellence, poor staffing ratios, and burnout is astronomical. Magnet status has proven to not only be the most effective way to retain nurses and provide superior health care, but it has also proven that nurses are at the forefront of these trends and issues. We set these standards, and we carry them out to the very best of our knowledge and expertise. It starts with nurses standing up and not being okay with the conditions they are forced to work in; it starts with the research that validates these concerns. It starts with us.
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Question 
NURS 3100 Week 3 Assignment 1 – Impact of Nurses On Health Care Quality
For this Discussion, you explore how Magnet status contributes to health care change within an institution and the personal contribution nurses make to this process.
- Review the Discussion Rubric for Week 3, provided in the Course Information area or accessible through the link below.
- Review the Academic Writing Expectations (AWE) Checklist, Weeks 1–3, listed in this week’s Learning Resources.
- Review the video Issues and Trends in Nursing: Professional Practice Models (Laureate Education, 2009b).
- Review the following articles from this week’s Resources: