For-profit health care crisis
Nursing shortage causes more patient deaths
By Sharon Eolis, RN
The diagnosis of a nursing shortage leads to the prognosis
of patient deaths. That was the conclusion of a patient-care
study published in the May 30 edition of the New England
Journal of Medicine.
Jack Needleman, an economist at the Harvard School of Public
Health and the lead author of the report, said, "I estimate
that hundreds and perhaps thousands of deaths each year are due
to low staffing."
He added, "Nurses are the eyes and ears of the
hospital."
It's true. Nurses spot changes in patients' conditions that
can be early warnings of complications. Patients in facilities
with more registered nurses had shorter stays and fewer
complications--2 percent to 9 percent less--than hospitals with
less staff.
Mary Foley, president of the American Nurses Association,
said, "We're pleased that another large set of research data
has validated what the ANA has been saying since the
mid-1990s--that there is a direct effect on the outcome of
patient care when you have enough nurses."
The national shortage of nurses affects both the quality and
quantity of care. Today nurses are frequently forced to work
additional shifts when they are exhausted. This impedes
critical thinking and can lead to mistakes.
The workload increase and mandatory overtime are results of
massive hospital layoffs to save money. The hospitals have
frequently brought in technicians and others help to replace
nurses.
Many studies have shown that the nursing shortage has
contributed to more complications, longer hospital stays and
more deaths because overworked nurses were unable to intervene
and reverse early symptoms of complication.
The American Hospital Association acknowledged that there is
a severe nursing shortage: 126,000 job vacancies nationally,
which is equivalent to 12 percent of hospital capacity.
Higher death rate in for-profit hospitals
Hospital management, insurance companies and HMOs all blame
each other for the shortage. The truth is that they all share
in the blame as proponents of for-profit health care that puts
patients' needs and workers' rights far down on the list of
priorities.
A study by Canadian researchers released May 28 showed that
for-profit hospitals in the United States have a patient death
rate 2 percent higher than public hospitals. This despite all
the cutbacks that have devastated public health care over the
last two decades.
Dr. P. J. Devereaux of McMaster University in Ontario, the
lead author of the Canadian report, said the 2-percent higher
death rate might seem slight. But it translates into many
patients.
The study in the New England Journal of Medicine concluded
with its own shocking statistics. In low-staffed hospitals,
lack of nursing care contributed to a 2.5-percent higher rate
of "failure to rescue" than in hospitals with more staff.
This means that patients died at a higher rater from
conditions that might have been reversed had they been treated
in time.
Racism, sexism and anti-gay/anti-trans bias impede access to
health care for many in the United States. There are tens of
millions of people--including low-wage earners, undocumented
workers, welfare recipients and their children--who are
uninsured or under-insured.
Health care should be a right for all, not a privilege.
Hospital workers, patients and communities must fight for a
national health-care system and laws that provide care for all
people, as well as staffing ratios that safeguard patients'
lives. This includes providing funds for nursing students and
opportunities for health-care workers to expand their
skills.
Reprinted from the June 20, 2002, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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Email: ww@workers.org
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