Writer’s choice
To Prepare:
Review the national healthcare issue/stressor you examined in your Assignment for Module 1, and review the analysis of the healthcare issue/stressor you selected.
Identify and review two evidence-based scholarly resources that focus on proposed policies/practices to apply to your selected healthcare issue/stressor.
Reflect on the feedback you received from your colleagues on your Discussion post regarding competing need..
Add a section to the paper you submitted in Module 1. The new section should address the following:
Identify and describe at least two competing needs impacting your selected healthcare issue/stressor.
Describe a relevant policy or practice in your organization that may influence your selected healthcare issue/stressor.
Critique the policy for ethical considerations, and explain the policy’s strengths and challenges in promoting ethics.
Recommend one or more policy or practice changes designed to balance the competing needs of resources, workers, and patients, while addressing any ethical shortcomings of the existing policies. Be specific and provide examples.
Cite evidence that informs the healthcare issue/stressor and/or the policies, and provide two scholarly resources in support of your policy or practice recommendations.
PLEASE USE MY ATTACHED FILE
Analysis of the Critical Care Nurse Burnout Issue in Healthcare
Introduction
Critical care burnout among nurses is one of the most vital issues in the healthcare sector that requires urgent address and management. The increased rates of burnout, or rather the burnout syndrome among critical care nurses is developed from excessive and prolonged stress hence resulting in exhaustion of the physical and mental state of an individual. The increased rate of burnout among nurses is usually work-related. It tends to manifest in the inability to balance the expectations of the job and among the nurses that develop the syndrome. In this analysis, the nurse burnout issue is discussed at length with the competing needs present, and policy recommendations made following the review of three scholarly sources that provide an effective solution to the menace.
Competing Needs
As discussed above, burnout syndrome has increased drastically among the critical nurses in their quest to perform their duties effectively; hence, making is a national stressor that affects all the involved stakeholders. Critical care nurses work for very long hours with a stressful working environment, which is characterized by traumatic encounters, morbidity, and mortality rates among the patients, stringent work schedules, and ethical practice issues. A stressful working environment is likely to result in exhaustion and fatigue, especially if it is accompanied by long working hours and high inability to maintain a balanced work-personal life. Hence, among nurses, burnout results in detrimental effects that affect the organization, patients, and the nurses among other staff and stakeholders. Burnout cases are associated with reduced quality of health care services, which results in numerous medical errors, decreased satisfaction among employees, and, most importantly, maximized rates of HCAIs and mortality cases.
In the organization, many nurses and staff have resigned, hence, increasing the turnover rates, which in most cases have been associated with increased burnout levels among the nurses. When asked the reasons for quitting, they describe the increased working pressures in the working environment that increases fatigue and stress, eventually underperforming and decreased productivity. Moreover, the nurses seem overworked and lack adequate support, for instance, of better and flexible working schedules and tools to maximize a balance in their work and personal lives. Concisely, the increased burnout cases among nurses correlate highly with the increasing turnover rates, which is invoked or motivated by the stressful working atmosphere, long working hours that result in stress and fatigue, and the flexible working schedules that minimize their work-life balance. Eventually, the nurses are ‘worn out’ mentally and physically, leading into underperformance. There is a need to provide support to the nurses through policy changes and increased human labor for flexibility and balances.
Article Review on the Relevant Policy
The rates of burnout among critical care nurses must be addressed and solved completely to reduce healthcare-acquired adverse effects and consequences. To address this issue, authors, scholars, and researchers have identified various solutions. For instance, in a systematic review article conducted on the rates of burnout in ICU, the authors develop a correlation between the burnout cases involving fatigue and stress with work environment and experience, which threatens patient treatment and care adversely (Chien-Huai Chuang, 2016). The authors suggest that enhancing the ICU working environment among the nurses could help highly reduce fatigue and burnout issues. The authors agree that the ICU working environment is susceptible or defenseless against a stressful working environment accompanied by long working hours and a high inability to maintain a balanced work-personal life, which results in exhaustion and fatigue eventually underperforming and decreased productivity.
In the other articles focusing on the prevalence of burnout syndrome among the nurses, the authors recommend extensive support of the nurses to help cope with the working environments, which would work as a coping mechanism. The authors argue that nurses can receive support from peer groups where they share their experiences and describe their traumatic events to help address the spillover effects of the stress on their mental health (Campos, 2017). Secondly, through the support and opening up, the nurses can receive mindful training that improves and enhances their levels of attentiveness and responsiveness to their duties and the needs of the patients. Through the support and training, an adaptive working environment is created (Kleinpell, 2020). Moreover, the training should emphasize teamwork, which would increase their engagement, participation, and morale resulting in decreased fatigue and stress. According to the authors, cooperation is necessary as well as building strong interpersonal relationships to help them conduct their duties and cope with the working environment.
Policy Implementation and Recommendations
Addressing the burnout issue in the organization and improving healthcare providence and satisfaction among patients requires adopting the solutions provided, including providing support, training, and education as a coping mechanism of nurses in the working conditions and improving the working environment to provide flexible and adaptable experiences among the nurses. The purpose of understanding and learning about the problem is to find effective and efficient solutions, as leaving the issues unaddressed, is likely to affect all involved stakeholders in the organization. Therefore, minimizing the burnout syndrome among nurses as well as eliminating the sources, can be effective and should be the primary goal of the organization. When improving the working environment to provide flexible and adaptable experiences among the nurses, it is essential to train nurses and other involved parties on the importance of ethical practices to avoid noncompliance and legal problems. The company should clearly communicate the expected ethical and moral standards among the staff and practices to minimize cases in the future following noncompliance, which is a source of stress among nurses.
In addition, the organization should consider developing peer groups among the nurses to enhance opening up, building relationships, networking, and forming teams. Cohesiveness, just like in a family, is essential among nurses, as it would help them address their problems by easily sharing their traumatic experiences with the ‘family’ they know at the workplace. Therefore, new departments on counseling and stress management should be introduced as well as team-building strategies to keep the team engaged and motivated. Most importantly, the organization should consider revising its hiring and selection policy to increase the labor force hence providing double or triple schedules in a day to ensure nurses do not overwork by having very long hours that contribute to the burnout syndrome.
Conclusion
The burnout problem among nurses must be addressed adequately as it affects the healthcare system, organizations, nurses, and patients negatively. An organization with stressed and fatigued employees, the performance, and productivity is likely to decrease, which compromises the quality of care among patients that can result in increased deaths. Moreover, it affects the wellbeing of the staff and reduces the morale to work, which affects the general performance of the organization resulting in both financial and nonfinancial consequences.
References
Campos, E. M. (2017). Prevalence of burnout syndrome in emergency nurses: A meta-analysis. Critical Care Nurse, Vol 37(5).
Chien-Huai Chuang, P.-C. T.-Y.-H.-Y. (2016). Burnout in the intensive care unit professionals. Journal of Medicine (Baltimore).
Kleinpell, R. M. (2020). The Critical Nature of Addressing Burnout Prevention: Results From the Critical Care Societies Collaborative’s National Summit and Survey on Prevention and Management of Burnout in the ICU. Critical Care Medicine, Vol 48(2), pp; 249-253.
Analysis of a Pertinent Healthcare Issue
Introduction
Critical care nurse burnout is one of the most pertinent healthcare issues in the patient care field. Nurse burnout often results in the provision of poor patient care, affecting the expected patient care outcomes and the quality of service provided to patients. In this paper, nurse burnout is discussed, with a focus on the University of New Mexico Hospital (UNMH). Various recommendations on how nurse burnout and job fatigue in the provision of patient care can be minimized will be discussed. Also, two scholarly articles on the issue and proposed solutions will be discussed.
Nurse Fatigue and Burnout
Nurse fatigue and burnout in the patient care setting is very common as a result of long working hours, increased stress in the workplace, and the traumatic exposure that nurses go through in their daily work. The patient care environment comes with increased work pressure, resulting in a high rate of nurse burnout. Fatigue and nurse burnout easily translate to reduced empathy towards patients and reduced quality of patient care (Cocker & Joss, 2016). At the UNMH, nurse burnout is one of the top reasons for the institution having a high nurse turnover rate. Research on the reasons for the high employee turnover rate at the institution shows a significant relationship between nurse burnout and the rate of turnover (University of New Mexico, 2016). There are various reasons why the facility continues to face the nurse burnout and fatigue problem, including a lack of social support to nurses, a chaotic job environment, the ineffective control and scheduling of assignments and work, and imbalanced job-work life. Currently, UNMH is developing programs and activities that can reduce nurse burnout rates and minimize the rate of nurse turnover (University of New Mexico, 2016).
Article Review
Gómez-Urquiza et al. (2017), in an article titled Prevalence of burnout syndrome in emergency nurses: A meta-analysis, discuss the occupational health problem of burnout syndrome. The authors recognize burnout syndrome as one of the most common occupational health problems in the patient care field, providing an in-depth discussion of how the syndrome is common for a nurse working in the emergency sections. Also, the authors provide a number of interventions and recommendations that can be implemented to minimize burnout syndrome occurrences in patient care provision. According to Gómez-Urquiza et al. (2017), the formation of professional support peer groups where nurses can share their experiences and feelings, as well as the improvement of working conditions, can minimize the occurrence of burnout syndrome in the healthcare profession.
Gillespie and Melby (2003), in an article titled Burnout among nursing staff in accident and emergency and acute medicine: a comparative study, conducted a triangulated research on nurse burnout using both qualitative and quantitative research methods. The researchers aimed at determining the various factors that contribute to burnout and stress in the nursing profession, as well as the effect of burnout on patient care. The impact of stress and burnout on individuals outside the clinical environment was also assessed in this research. According to Gillespie and Melby (2003), there is a need to provide support networks to nurses, improve interpersonal relationships within the healthcare profession, and foster teamwork to improve morale and reduce stress. The researchers concluded that the provision of resources, support, and better education will minimize burnout and improve patient care in the healthcare environment.
Discussion
To improve patient care, nurse burnout and stress have to be minimized. This can be achieved by incorporating the proposed methods from the two articles reviewed. UNMH should focus on minimizing nurse stress and burnout through the implementation of peer support groups within the facility, the introduction of effective self-scheduling, and the improvement of the working conditions within the institution. To ensure the cooperation of nurses, proper information should be provided to ensure that everyone understands the aim of the changes being introduced. When the nurses and healthcare workers within the institution understand the purpose and the need for change, they are more likely to support the change and do what is expected of them within their work environments (University of New Mexico, 2016). Also, the institution’s management should streamline activities and work schedules to ensure that nurses achieve a work-life balance. Facilities for counseling and stress management should be installed to ensure that nurses can manage work stress effectively and avoid burnout. This way, the quality of patient care provided by nurses within the facility will be greatly improved.
Conclusion
In conclusion, nurse burnout is one of the most common occupational health problems in the patient care environment. It negatively affects nurse morale and performance, directly impacting the quality of patient care. It is, therefore, important to manage burnout through the provision of support and education to nurses. Institutions should ensure work-life balance for nurses and providing work schedules and peer support to minimize stress and burnout. This will ensure the provision of quality patient care and the increased productivity of nurses.
References
Cocker, F. & Joss, N. (2016). Compassion fatigue among healthcare, emergency and community service workers: A systematic review. International Journal of Environmental Public Health.
Gillespie, M. & Melby, V. (2003). Burnout among nursing staff in accident and emergency and acute medicine: A comparative study. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 12: 842–851.
Gómez-Urquiza, J. L., Fuente-Solana, E. I., Albendín-García, L., Vargas-Pecino, C., Ortega-
Campos, E. M., & Fuente, G. A. (2017). Prevalence of burnout syndrome in emergency nurses: A meta-analysis. Critical Care Nurse, 37(5).
University of New Mexico. (2016). The high cost of nurse turnover. Retrieved March 5, 2020, from https://rnbsnonline.unm.edu/articles/high-cost-of-nurse-turnover.aspx
PART 2
Developing Organizational Policies and Practices
Add a section to the paper you submitted in Module 1. The new section should address the following:
- Identify and describe at least two competing needs impacting your selected healthcare issue/stressor.
- Describe a relevant policy or practice in your organization that may influence your selected healthcare issue/stressor.
- Critique the policy for ethical considerations, and explain the policy’s strengths and challenges in promoting ethics.
- Recommend one or more policy or practice changes designed to balance the competing needs of resources, workers, and patients, while addressing any ethical shortcomings of the existing policies. Be specific and provide examples.
5 . Cite evidence that informs the healthcare issue/stressor and/or the policies, and provide two scholarly resources in support of your policy or practice recommendations.
