Family wins lawsuit against hospital for unsafe staffing

casper1 · Jan 23, 2006

Chance are if you have 20 patients in an acute care setting minimum of 5 would be in serious distress. The nurse was doing the best she could. Their very luck she stayed and attempted to care for the patients. I'm interested in knowing was this a normal assignment? Had their been several sick calls? No excuse for such poor staffing! I hope the nurse was not held accountable in any way.

bargainhound, RN · Jan 23, 2006

"But remember, the patients sleep at night so we don't have to worry about them complaining they don't feel well or having a problem".

I can't get over these remarks....there were some in the original article also.

Why does the public believe that there is nothing to do at night and that

patients sleep....etc......not true.

pickledpepperRN · Jan 23, 2006

We use an "Assignment Despite Objection form" (ADO) stating that as a patient advocate I am objecting to this assignmentbut will do my best. The facility is responsible for any harm due to unsafe staffing.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4587667

...“You’re just thrown in the deep end ... too many patients, too many tasks,” says RN Alison Goodman, whom Wesley Hospital fired 3½ years ago after she repeatedly filed complaints about unsafe RN staffing levels and gave her reports to attorney Prochaska.

Hospital spokeswoman Helen Thomas says Goodman was fired for breaking patient confidentiality rules...