Pennsylvania Lawmakers Consider Nurse-Patient Ratio Legislation

strider1500 · Mar 8, 2008

When I worked as an Aide for a large Pittsburgh area health system, it was not uncommon for nurses to have ten patients.

This was a Med-Surg floor. Once a week I saw nurses with tears in their eyes.

geekgolightly, BSN, RN · Mar 8, 2008

When I worked as an Aide for a large Pittsburgh area health system, it was not uncommon for nurses to have ten patients.
This was a Med-Surg floor. Once a week I saw nurses with tears in their eyes.

That is frightening.

My raio is half that. Once in three years I have had 6 patients instead of 5, and it was due to severe staffing issues. My manager apologised and thanked us for that day as well.

I work in Kansas City.

adamsmom · Mar 9, 2008

I have seen nurses in a Philly suburb hospital have 8 on first shift. Then the other day in the same hospital they had 4pts on first shift. So it varies alot.

geekgolightly, BSN, RN · Mar 9, 2008

I hope that there are better numbers, and that these are exceptions to the rule :uhoh3: .

I have been considering ICU and if med-surg is this poorly staffed, I will diligently work on getting an ICU position. Unless of course they stak ICU with 3 and 4 pt each.

dawngloves, BSN, RN · Mar 10, 2008

I've worked in ICUs where there was a three pt assignment. There is no law in PA mandating ratios. You get what you get and hope it doesn't get worse.

K98 · Mar 18, 2008

The nursing staff at AGH in Pittsburgh are unionized, and negotiated nurse-patient ratios as part of their labor agreement. The ICUs are 1-1 or 2-1, I'm not certain what the telemetry and medical-surgical floors are. My daughter works for the DarkSide, and they have no ratios. Assignments are heavy and mandation is common.

ChristineN, BSN, RN · Mar 19, 2008

The nursing staff at AGH in Pittsburgh are unionized, and negotiated nurse-patient ratios as part of their labor agreement. The ICUs are 1-1 or 2-1, I'm not certain what the telemetry and medical-surgical floors are. My daughter works for the DarkSide, and they have no ratios. Assignments are heavy and mandation is common.

Mandation from the"Darkside?!" I work for the Darkside and was under the impression they can not mandate? *confused*

K98 · Mar 20, 2008

That's news to me. My daughter was mandated last week. Twice.

adamsmom · Mar 20, 2008

I graduate in May and I was wondering what you mean by mandate? Do they force you to work a double if there is a call off? But you are only allowed to work 16hr/24hr period right?

ChristineN, BSN, RN · Mar 22, 2008

That's news to me. My daughter was mandated last week. Twice.

I would suggest you encourage her to check her policy and procedure manual on the topic. My boss would try to mandate, but we knew that it was against "darkside" policy and did not fall for it.

geekgolightly, BSN, RN · Aug 7, 2008

I interviewed with the two major hospitals in Erie and one of them has a medsurg ratio of 8+ on nights and 6+ on days. I don't know the numbers for the other hospital; I never asked. I was interviewing for ICU positions at both hospitals.

The ICU's, OTOH are 1:2 unless they are on CRRT or other intensive monitoring and needs and then it's 1:1. They do stack higher, but only with tele or floor orders that are awaiting transfer. One of the hospitals has a charge nurse without patients and one has the charge nurse take patients. I chose the one with a free charge nurse. That hospital also seemed to be more into teaching in general, which I appreciate and need at this point as I will be new to ICU nursing.