This essay by Grace Ojebode delves into the pressing issue of nursing shortage in the global healthcare sector, examining its causes and far-reaching effects on patient care and the nursing profession. Ojebode identifies key factors contributing to the shortage, such as population growth, declining interest in nursing careers, low wages, and increased workload. The essay explores the consequences of this shortage, including stressed and understaffed conditions leading to medical errors and compromised patient care. To address this critical issue, Ojebode proposes recommendations such as efficient workforce recruitment, training programs, wage increases, and enhanced infrastructural resources to improve the quality of care in healthcare institutions.
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Casual Essay Topic Proposal
Grace Ojebode
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Topic: The cause and effect of nursing shortage
Nurses are mainly involved in the aid work at health care organizations. Their key roles include
assisting the patient, taking care of the needs of the patient, providing follow-ups to the doctor
and making the daily routine of the patient easy. However, the problem of nursing shortage is
rampant in the global health care industry.
There is a rapid shortage in the number of nurses in the hospitals in the recent time. Some of the
reasons for this shortage can include growth in population, decrease in number of applicants to
nursing schools and nursing educator, aging workforce, aging baby boomer that will require
health care services. However, there is a dire need to cope with this problem to cater to the health
care demands appropriately (Allen, 2008). This underlying essay aims at examining the cause
and effect of the nursing shortage.
The current shortage in the number of nurses reflects that fewer people are entering into the
health care industry. Initially, the rise in the income of the nurses had led to the increasing
number of people to enter in the health care industry (Finlayson et al 2002). However, as the
demand of nurses in the industry rises due to factor like baby booming, the nursing shortage is a
critical concern. The shortage in the number of nurses in the health care institutions often leads
to problems such as working long hours under stressful conditions, understaffed which lead to
tiredness, injury, and not showing interest in job (Allen, 2008). This enables the existing nursing
staff to commit mistakes and medical errors leading to the low quality of care. As a result, the
patients tend to suffer, leading to complications, including medication errors, frequent
emergency room visit and increase in mortality rate.
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Causes of nursing shortage
There are multitudes of causes that have led to the problem of nursing shortage across the global
healthcare industry. These causes reflect the changes in the demographics of population,
employment patterns of women and healthcare system. As per the reports, one of the key causes
of nursing shortage is the growth in population (Finlayson et al 2002). It is projected that by
2020, the population is expected to grow by 18% and the people over 65 years will need more
health care assistance (Allen, 2008). Due to this, the existing nursing staff is less to cater to the
growing demands of the people. Another probable cause for nursing shortage is the rise of other
career options than nursing. There have been many changes in the social and employment
patterns. This has encouraged the women to take up other career options and earn better
livelihood for themselves. This could be a serious reason for the shortage in the number of nurses
in health care industry. The third cause for nursing shortage is low wages. Initially, the wages for
the nursing staff have risen but these fell down by 1992 (Janiszewski Goodin, 2003). Hence, less
number of people is interested to get into an industry where the wages are low and work is high.
Another cause for the nursing shortage is the increased workload on the existing nursing staff. As
the hospitals experienced severe cost pressure in 1990s, they hired less number of staff to cut the
cost (Janiszewski Goodin, 2003). This eventually led to increase of the overtime and workload
on the existing staff. Therefore, much of the staff resigned which created a shortage of nurses.
Effects of nursing shortage
There are various effects of the nursing shortage. Most importantly, this has impacted the quality
of the care and the reputation of the nursing as a career option. This problem leads to high stress
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for the nursing staff since they are made to work long hours under stressful conditions. Also, the
understaffed conditions in the hospitals results in tiredness, injury, and low engagement of the
nurses to their work (Finlayson et al 2002). As a result, they do not show much interest in their
job and treat their patients casually. This enables the existing nursing staff to commit mistakes
and medical errors leading to the low quality of care. The patients are made to suffer, leading to
complications, including medication errors, frequent emergency room visit and increase in
mortality rate.
All these problems tend to result in increased dissatisfaction among the nursing staff and high
probability of the workers to leave their job soon. This creates further shortage of nursing staff
and make situation even more critical. The dissatisfaction among the nurses is reflected in the
quality of work they do at the hospitals. As a result, the patients are not taken care of, which can
deteriorate the health of the person (Finlayson et al 2002).
These effects ruin the quality of care at the health care organizations and required to be
immediately addressed. Hence, some steps have been proposed below that aim at addressing the
problem of nursing shortage.
Recommendations
To cope with the problem of nursing shortage, there are several strategies that can be employed
to address the nursing shortage. The first strategy is to recruit an efficient workforce in hospitals.
To cater to the needs of the growing population, one strategy is to train the existing staff and
make them competent to deal with the situation. This requires a significant investment from the
healthcare institutions. Another strategy is to increase the wages for the nurses by allocating
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suitable resources. The hike in the wages can be an efficient step to address the problem of
nursing shortage. Another strategy is to hire diverse nurses to cater to the sensitive needs of the
patients. One strategy is to improve the quality of care at hospitals and providing better
infrastructural resources to the nurses.
Conclusion
To conclude, it can be indicated that nursing shortage is a critical problem in the global health
care industry. It has led to many problems for the patients and also deteriorated the quality of
care at hospitals. Therefore, there is an immediate need to cope with it by adopting the
recommendations proposed above.