Staffing ratios

allnurses Guide · Oct 6, 2015

So sorry, I should have clicked these links, I thought they were the same as the first two links. Much better.

For each bill there is a "Summary" and "Text". You can go from one to the other.

House Bill Summary:

https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/1602

Text:

https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/1602/text

lindarn · Oct 7, 2015

Just remember when talking to politicians about this bill, remind them that TEACHERS HAVE HAD CLASSROOM RATIOS FOR YEARS. AND WHY DID TEACHERS PUSH FOR RATIOS IN THE CLASSROOMS? BECAUSE IT WAS DETERMINED BY STUDIES, THAT IF THERE ARE TOO MANY STUDENTS IN THE CLASSROOMS, THAT THEY DON'T LEARN. IMAGINE THAT!

It is interesting that it took until the 1990's for any study to be done on staffing ratios, and it did not even come from nursing or the ANA. It came from the Institute of Medicine. Why was that? Because the PTB did not want the public to know how their lives were a risk when they were in the hospital, preferring to blame nurses for being whiney, and not having good, "organization skills", if they could not get their work accomplished on their shift. Blame the victim. It works every time.

REMIND THEM THAT NO ONE EVER DIED BECAUSE THEY COULD NOT DO LONG DIVISION A SENTENCE, BUT PATIENTS ARE DYING BECAUSE NURSES HAVE TOO MANY PATIENTS TO BE RESPONSIBLE FOR. PERIOD.

IS ANYONE AMBITIOUS ENOUGH TO CALL ELLEN ON TV, AND TRY TO GET SOME TV EXPOSURE FOR THIS ISSUE?

WE GO HER ATTENTION WITH THE ISSUE OF THE TV SHOW, "THE VOICE", THIS MIGHT BE A GOOD TIME TO CAPITALIZE ON THE EXPOSURE OF NURSES IN THE MEDIA.

JMHO AND MY NY $0.02

Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN,(ret )

Somewhere in the PACNW

AcuteHD · Oct 7, 2015

Just remember when talking to politicians about this bill...

Please refer to the AN TOS related to use of all caps. Thanks.

lindarn · Oct 9, 2015

I meant, "diagram a sentence".

Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN, (RET)

Somewhere in the PACNW

AcuteHD · Oct 9, 2015

I meant, "diagram a sentence".

what?

nursecathi · Oct 9, 2015

Not sure I want the government with no healthcare experience dictating how many patients I can safely take care of.

allnurses Guide · Oct 10, 2015

Not sure I want the government with no healthcare experience dictating how many patients I can safely take care of.

Have you read the bills?

https://www.congress.gov/114/bills/s864/BILLS-114s864is.pdf

https://www.congress.gov/114/bills/hr1602/BILLS-114hr1602ih.pdf

allnurses Guide · Oct 10, 2015

The federal bills posted here have better ratios than what we achieved in California.

lindarn · Oct 10, 2015

My above post stated that, teachers have had student teacher ratios for years, because it was determined that, if a teacher had too many students in his/her, classrooms, that students did not learn. Since teachers are almost universally unionized, and can act in unison, they have the clout to enforce these teacher/student ratios,

My comment was, that, no one ever died because they could not do long division, or diagram a sentence, but patients did not fare as well, when nurses had too many patients to be responsible for. As documented in the report from the IOM.

So why do nurses have to fight to get the right to decide how many patients to care for?

That is what I meant.

Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN, (ret)

Somewhere in the PACNW

guest64485 · Oct 10, 2015

Not sure I want the government with no healthcare experience dictating how many patients I can safely take care of.

As opposed to my floor manager saying we needed to alter our new staffing acuity form when it showed we should have less patients per nurse? Thanks but I'll take government laws. The ones listed here or even the ones in California would be amazing to have.

AcuteHD · Oct 10, 2015

As opposed to my floor manager saying we needed to alter our new staffing acuity form when it showed we should have less patients per nurse? Thanks but I'll take government laws. The ones listed here or even the ones in California would be amazing to have.

I guess that's pretty universal, it happened to me when I worked the floor. Come to HD, many (most?) states have mandated ratios. Not great ratios, but at least there is a limit.

kspi355 · Oct 11, 2015

Not sure I want the government with no healthcare experience dictating how many patients I can safely take care of.

No healthcare experience? Well sure, things don't have experience, but people do. And nursing is all about Evidenced-Based Practice, so if you're objecting to law based off of evidence I'm either going to laugh or cry, not sure which.

But if you really want to be comfortable with the decision you make to support or not support these bills, I invite you to read them and decide for yourself. Trust but verify? Time to strap on your doctor's stethoscope (LOL) and get to work. This country didn't build itself.