Nursing Understaffing Research Article

Nurse understaffing is viewed as a significant risk in healthcare. The study is about patients who are admitted to ICU (intensive care unit) and a step-down unit for a less than three months. Patients who developed health care-associated infections were compared to those who did not develop anything. It is viewed that excess nursing workload was the only risk that was experienced mostly when compared to the others which included mechanical ventilation (Daud-Gallotti et al., 2012). Procedures that are practiced are the leading causes of health care-associated infections, which are caused by traditional risk factors such as contamination, and inadequate methods of sterile techniques. If safe practices are implemented, an outbreak of an infection will become rare.

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Research has been carried out to determine prevention measures associated with these infections. However, its implementation may become a challenge. Healthcare-associated infection is determined by considering different factors which include underlying diseases, their demographic data, duration in which one has stayed in the hospital, the original condition of the patient by the time he/she was being admitted to the hospital, patient response to the nursing services offered to them.

Patients who developed healthcare-associated infection only during the first infection were considered, for those who did not develop anything during their full period of hospitalization were has also examined. Different adverse effects occurred in the patients, and they included phlebitis, falls, hypoglycemia and ulcers associated with pressure. All the patients were evaluated for the whole period during hospitalization within the unit and the entire hospital. The comparison was made between patients who develop health care-associated infections and those who did not develop anything during their entire stay in the unit. The level of patients illness can be evaluated using different methods which include duration in which one has been in the ICU (intensive care unit), excess nurse workload and how the patients complied with the methods which were used. Other factors were also considered which included endoscopy, mechanical ventilation, urinary catheters, hemodialysis, nutrition and use of blood products. Patients with health care associated infections have high chances of being exposed to other diseases for the duration in which they are in the ICU.

In this study, many disadvantages can be concluded which are, only involved patients in medical ICUs and not any other person within the hospital. Also, surgical patients who were under critical care were not part of the study. It was also found out that many patients who had undergone surgery are not complicated as compared to medical patients in the study. However, adverse events that are related to surgery are the main causes of harm to patients who are in hospitals.

Patients who needed mechanical ventilation had the same sleeping results being same to those who were still normal. Thus, mechanical ventilation was not a primary factor that affected the way patients slept in the hospitals. Nevertheless, Benzodiazepine therapy was continuously distributed to patients with mechanical ventilation and to their counterparts which were breathing regularly (Fanfulla, et al., 2011 p. 360). Mechanical ventilation affected sleep for patients who had chronic respiratory failures.

Despite not carrying full analysis on every factor that causes healthcare associated infections than most hospitals provide care to patients with complications. The results are termed as valid because the study was based on a sample representative of some population also this can be applied to patient care and help to improve the health of the patient by taking care of them and knowing their progress.

References

Daud-Gallotti, R. M., Costa, S. F., Guimaraes, T., Padilla, K. G., Inoue, E. N., Vasconcelos, T. N. Levin, A. S. (2012). Nursing Workload as a Risk Factor for Healthcare Associated Infections in ICU: A Prospective Study. PLoS ONE, 7(12), e52342. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0052342. Retrieved from http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0052342

Fanfulla, F., Ceriana, P., DArtavilla Lupo, N., Trentin, R., Frigerio, F., & Nava, S. (2011). Sleep Disturbances in Patients Admitted to a Step-Down Unit After ICU Discharge: the Role of Mechanical Ventilation. Sleep, 34(3), 355362.