Tuesday Reporter

Vol . 5, #6

It's Not Just Nurses Who
Want Safe Ratios

It's not just nurses who want to see safe RN staffing legislation passed, it's also the Coalition to Protect Massachusetts Patients, an alliance that now includes 71 leading health care and consumer organizations, including a growing number of organizations that speak for the elderly.

Boston ElderINFO(BEI) is the latest to join the Coalition. BEI is a program of the ElderCare Alliance. The Alliance is a not-for-profit collaboration of three Boston home care agencies, also known as Aging Services Access Points (ASAP's): Boston Senior Home Care, Central Boston Elder Services and Ethos.

"As our organization works with elders who come to our agencies after hospital stays, we clearly recognize the impact poor RN staffing has on elders, and the need for appropriate ratios in acute care settings to set the stage for a successful return to independence and appropriate recovery in the home care setting," said Bryna Lansky, Director of the program.

Other organizations that focus on the elderly in the Coalition include the Massachusetts Association of Older Americans, Massachusetts Senior Action Council and the Alzheimer's Association of Massachusetts.

 

The Truth About the Nursing Shortage in Massachusetts: There is None!

Contrary to claims by the hospital industry that there are not enough nurses in Massachusetts to meet the requirements of legislation establishing minimum, safe RN-to-patient ratios, there is not one shred of evidence to substantiate any claim of a shortage in the supply of nurses in the Commonwealth.

Here are the facts:

  • According to the National Survey of Registered Nurses, Massachusetts ranks number 1 in the nation in the supply of nurses per capita. While the national average is 782 nurses per 100,000 population, in Massachusetts there are 1,194 nurses per capita, more than 52% higher than the national average.
  • The Board of Registration in Nursing reports that the RN population in Massachusetts has increased by 11% between 1992 and 2002.
  • During the same time period, the number of hospital beds required to be staffed by RNs has decreased by more than 30%. We have more nurses to staff fewer beds.

So What's the Problem?
We don't have a shortage in the supply of nurses. We have a shortage of nurses who are willing to work in hospitals with the poor staffing ratios that currently exist. The hospital industry has deliberately operated hospitals with fewer nurses to cut costs at the expense of patient care. During the 1990's Massachusetts hospitals cut RN staffing by almost 30%, more than any state in the nation.

The result:

  • 87% of Massachusetts nurses surveyed say they have too many patients.
  • 93% say that RN burnout from these conditions has caused nurses to leave the bedside.
  • 53% of RNs currently working say that they considered leaving the hospital bedside because of poor conditions.
  • A 2002 survey of nurses who left the hospital bedside found that staffing ratios and workload were the top two reasons for their exodus.

The Good News is With Ratios, Nurses Will Return
A 2003 survey of those nurses currently sitting on the sidelines found that 65% (more than 42,000 RNs) would go back to hospital nursing if the safe RN staffing bill were passed.

       
Tuesday Reporter    

California Nurses Take on the Terminator

The 60,000-strong members of the California Nurses Association have fired back at former body-builder and actor, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, with a national TV campaign describing him as just another tool of monied corporate interests (the California hospital industry).

The 60-second spot opens with the governor's foot-in-mouth comments about nurses being "special interests" who are mad at him because "I kick their butt."

The ad then kicks some butt of its own, as veteran nurses respond both to Schwarzenegger's comments and to his plan to freeze nurse-patient staffing levels – without any data to support the move. A 20-year veteran nurse, in an observation that should be directed to our Massachusetts hospitals and nursing administrators, says: "One day you will be in that bed and realize that because of the number of patients one nurse has to take care of, you may be calling, and there's nobody there."

  

In Their Own Words. . .Why Nurses Support
RN-to-Patient Ratios

"As a proud and dedicated RN at Lawrence General Hospital, I implore you to support the Safe RN Staffing bill. During my five years in the nursing profession, my elation with bedside nursing has plummeted to despair. I cannot truly care for my patients if expected to accept assignments that are grossly unsafe. It is shocking to know that the mortality risk for patients increases by 7% with each patient above 4 in a given assignment. That is a 14-21% increase of death for a patient whose nurse has an assignment of 6-7 patients! That is an average assignment for nurses at our institution.

I chose this profession, or rather this profession chose me, to be a servant to humanity, and I gladly accepted. However, after just five years of hospital nursing, my eyes are opened and my heart is heavy, laden with the fact that I will not continue in this profession unless there is a change in RN-to-patient ratios.

Unsafe staffing is not an esoteric topic. There has been much research conducted by health care and medical associations. If you are unfamiliar with their results, I suggest becoming educated on the conclusions. As the new legislative session begins, I urge that action be taken on the Patient Safety/Safe RN Staffing bill to set minimum registered nurse-to-patient ratios in hospitals. Its common sense."

                                                                        — A nurse from North Andover