Reuters: Nurses Need Better Working Conditions

[Zee_RN, BSN, RN]

Nurses Need Better Working Conditions: IOM Report

Reuters Health Information 2003. © 2003 Reuters Ltd.

By Maggie Fox

WASHINGTON (Reuters) Nov 04 - Tired nurses forget to wash their hands, give the wrong drugs to patients, and waste hours on paperwork, a panel of experts said in a report calling for shorter hours and better working conditions for the profession.

The changes - including 12-hour limit on their workday - would reduce medical errors and make conditions better for nurses and patients alike, an Institute of Medicine (IOM) panel said on Tuesday.

"We need to move ahead urgently with these recommendations," Donald Steinwachs, chair of the committee that wrote the report, told a news conference.

"The benefits go beyond saving lives," he added, saying changes would make nurses less likely to quit or change jobs and would save money spent treating patients hurt by costly mistakes. Steinwachs is chairman of the department of health policy and management at the Johns Hopkins University school of public health in Baltimore.

"No one or two actions by themselves can keep patients safe," Steinwachs added. "Rather, creating work environments that reduce errors and increase patient safety will require fundamental changes in how nurses work, how they are deployed, and how the very culture of the organization understands and acts on safety."

The nation's 2.2 million registered nurses, 700,000 licensed practical and vocational nurses, and 2.3 million nursing assistants are the front line in caring for patients and protecting them against errors, the report said.

It cited a study in two hospitals that found nurses intercepted 86% of medication errors before they reached patients.

Medication errors include giving the wrong drug, giving the wrong amount, giving it the wrong way - orally versus intravenously, for instance - or giving it at the wrong time, said Ada Sue Hinshaw, dean of the University of Michigan school of nursing.

The IOM, which advises the federal government on medical matters, found in a 1998 report that medical errors cost up to $29 billion each year and kill as many as 98,000 people.

State regulators should ban nursing staff from working more than 12 hours a day and more than 60 hours per week, the committee said.

"Every safety-sensitive industry ... sets some sort of boundary on hours," said Hinshaw - referring to regulations affecting truckers, train crews, pilots and a variety of other industries.

The recommendations echo groundbreaking changes made by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, which set new standards in July that limit hospital work by residents to 80 hours a week.

The report said regulations setting minimum standards for staffing in nursing homes need to be updated. The report says the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services should require nursing homes to have at least one registered nurse in the building at all times.

Hospital intensive care units need to aim for one nurse for every two ICU patients.

Better conditions may often mean shifting nurses' work to others - including paperwork and moving patients around, the panel said. But some hospitals and nursing homes may need to hire more nurses, they said.

In July 2002, an HHS report forecast a 12% shortfall in the national supply of nurses by 2010 and 20% by 2015.

NOTE: To view the article with Web enhancements, go to:

http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/463944

[jnette, ASN, EMT-I]

Well bless their hearts. I'm not too crazy about the way this was written... first focus on how nurses screw up... no wonder the patients' families camp out in the rooms.

I also noticed no mention was made of minimum staffing ratios other than ICU.

Surely they can come up with something better than THIS???

This is OLD news, folks. I want to hear something NEW and HELPFUL !!!

[Repat]

I wonder how many nurses were on the "panel of experts"....

[Repat]

I have answered my own question - 6 out of the 18 panel members are nurses!

[dawngloves, BSN, RN]

Thanks IOM! How astute of you!

I guess no one would take our word for it.