Lowering nurse-to-patient ratios improves patient outcomes

¶ … optimal care for all patients is the number one priority for health care professionals. Nurses, who work one on one with patients, require the kinds of working conditions conducive to proper patient care. Availability of medical supplies and a safe hospital care environment are a few of the salient factors affecting a nursing staff's ability to treat patients. However, the most important issue ensuring optimal patient care is a small nurse-to-patient ratio. The current regulations allow for a nurse-to-patient ratio of 1 to 8. The 1 to 8 ratio is too large for most health care institutions, and can lead to a host of significant problems including job stress for nurses, medical errors, financial losses, and a decrease in patient satisfaction and recovery rates.

A high nurse-to-patient ratio naturally leads to increased stress levels for health care staff. Being in charge of too many patients means having to run from bed to bed, offering curt answers to patient and staff questions. Under stress, nurses are more likely to make preventable mistakes, lose medical documents, administer procedures or medications carelessly, or exhibit signs of anxiety or anger. Increased stress levels can also cause absenteeism and other job-related problems. In addition to reducing the quality of patient care, stress can cost the health care institution losses in employee productivity.

When nurses are in charge of too many patients, they can only devote a limited amount of time to each one. Patients deserve as much time and attention as a nurse can possibly provide but when a nurse is in charge of eight patients at once she or he can only spend a few minutes with each one. When a patient requires additional care, nurses are unable to provide it. Therapeutic care is ultimately compromised when nurses have a high case load. Nurses can be more attentive to each patient when case loads are low. When nurses spend more time with each patient, symptoms are noticed earlier, allowing for more rapid diagnoses and recovery times.