{"id":4934,"date":"2018-03-28T13:21:35","date_gmt":"2018-03-28T17:21:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/?p=4934"},"modified":"2018-04-16T12:44:12","modified_gmt":"2018-04-16T16:44:12","slug":"top-issues-facing-nurses-today","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/top-issues-facing-nurses-today","title":{"rendered":"What Are the Top Issues Facing Nurses Today?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
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Healthcare is an industry that evolves rapidly. Healthcare professionals\u00a0must, therefore, rapidly adapt as technology, medicine, and societal health concerns change. While this breakneck pace is a good thing in some ways, it also means that the issues the healthcare professionals encounter are constantly changing as well. Given that nurses are among the most integral members of the healthcare community, this is especially true for them. So, what are the top issues facing nurses today in 2018? Well, obviously this depends on whom you ask. However, even though some nurses will give varying responses, the American Nurses Association (ANA) has identified three areas that top the list<\/a>\u00a0of issues facing nurses today: safe staffing levels, mandatory overtime, and safety on the job. Of course, many nurses face other issues in their professional lives. However, for the purpose of this blog, we are going to focus on these three topics.<\/p>\n

The Three Top Issues Facing Nurses Today<\/h2>\n

\"Issues<\/p>\n

Safe Staffing Levels<\/h3>\n

Between different factors like the Affordable Care Act, which increased the number of insured Americans, and the aging population of the United States, the demand for healthcare services has grown rapidly in the past decade. While providers respond<\/a>\u00a0to this growth in demand differently, maintaining safe staffing levels of nurses has been difficult. Since the number of patients that hospitals and clinics see is increasing, the ratio of patients to nurses<\/a> has also been increasing. Given the problematic nursing shortage, it has not necessarily been easy to find a solution either. However, when too few nurses are responsible for too many patients, problems can arise for both the patients and the nurses caring for them. Looking ahead, it will be increasingly important for healthcare providers to ensure that they have an adequate number of nurses on staff to care for their patients.<\/p>\n

Mandatory Overtime<\/h3>\n

As is true across the healthcare industry, no two problems are entirely unrelated. This is especially true of the first two issues facing nurses today. As hospitals struggle to maintain safe staffing levels, they are frequently resorting to mandatory overtime for nurses. Nursing staffs are spread thinner than ever between the widespread national nursing shortage and temporary local shortages. In fact, more than half of all hospital nurses work more than 12 hours per day and 17 percent work mandatory overtime<\/a>. One possible solution to this problem is to employ more travel nurses when hospitals face temporary nursing shortages<\/a>. After all, that is a win-win situation for everyone involved!<\/p>\n

Safety on the Job<\/h3>\n

Job safety is important to all professions. Yet, nurses face many unique hazards. Common safety concerns for nurses include patient handling, safe needles, workplace violence, and illness. While you\u00a0can’t entirely control all of these hazards, there are best safety practices for nurses<\/a> that can help. Steps, like practicing proper sanitizing and using lift and transfer equipment when helping patients move, are important steps for keeping everyone safe on the job. However, given that this is a top issue facing nurses across the country, it is important for hospitals to recognize and take steps in addressing safety concerns as well.<\/p>\n

Do you experience these or other issues in your job? Let us know in the comments below! Nurses are central to the healthcare industry and yet their contributions unfortunately often go unrecognized and underappreciated. Healthcare administrators and professionals alike must all come together to recognize the top issues facing nurses and work towards solutions. This said, as we mentioned before, not all problems are universal. If you find that you are unsatisfied with your current position, consider looking for new nursing jobs<\/a> elsewhere! You never know, a different provider may just be a better fit for you in your professional life.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Healthcare is an industry that evolves rapidly. Healthcare professionals\u00a0must, therefore, rapidly adapt as technology, medicine, and societal health concerns change. While this breakneck pace is a good thing in some ways, it also means that the issues the healthcare professionals encounter are constantly changing as well. Given that nurses are among the most integral members […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4936,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[900,352,376],"class_list":["post-4934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nursing-issues","tag-issues-facing-nurses-today","tag-nursing-issues","tag-nursing-shortage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4934","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4934"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4934\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5024,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4934\/revisions\/5024"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.travelnursesource.com\/notes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}