Staff shortage leads to poor care

Study: High time pressure and rising staff shortage lead to a shortage of hospital patients. The low quality of care causes growing costs.

08/05/2013

A British study now concludes that up to 90 percent of caregivers in their most recent shift have a number of important tasks to do. Low quality of care therefore increases costs Nursing quality and the extent to which patients are harmed due to care deficiencies has been the subject of several recent UK studies.

At the end of July, another British study was published in the BMJ Quality and Safety with the result that certain care services can no longer be provided in state-owned British hospitals. It simply lacks the nurses for it. For example, 86 percent of the nurses interviewed for the study said that they can not properly complete one or more nursing activities during the most recent shift.

Staff shortage leaves patients unaided
With the undersupply of nurses is more time pressure. The nurses simply do not have the time. Hospital patients can not be properly cared for regularly.

Alone the creation and updating of care plans will fall by the wayside, which makes work even more difficult. Likewise the enlightenment of the patients. But there is also a lack of time to talk to patients and comfort them, the study reveals. According to experts in the UK, results are a consequence of budget cuts in the health sector. In the future, the government wants to focus more on home care for patients.

Germany no role model
In the WDR documentation "The next please! "- Nursing care hospital", the children's station manager of the Berlin Charié, Corinna Dacosta, sobering states: „I miss people almost every day. I always call colleagues from the spare time back to the station. They push tons of overtime ahead of them.

The study „Care Landscape 2030“ Prognos AG is aware of the blatant lack of development. While the number of employees declines due to demography, the number of people in need of care is rising from 2.4 million to 3.4 million in 2030. This trend is particularly driven by the aging population. Other, exacerbating influences, such as a relative increase in inpatient care or an increase in caregiver risk, are not included. Today, those in need of care are also provided with care by family members in addition to professional care (outpatient and inpatient care). From the increase in those in need of care, it is possible to derive an increased need for nursing care. By 2030, 506,000 nurses will be absent under otherwise unchanged conditions

Way out of politics: home care
The nursing expert Jürge Gohde presents today a care concept that is to prioritize the preservation of independence and health of older people and thus saves the needy for as long as possible the move to a home. The chairman of the Kuratorium Deutsche Altershilfe KDA was chairman of the Expert Advisory Council, which in 2009 handed over a first report on the reform of the need for care to the government. For a new edition by Federal Health Minister Bahr Gohde was no longer available. He gave the chair. (Fr)

Picture: Uta Herbert