Combat Seasonal Staff Shortages With the Help of a Nursing Agency
Winter is coming and that usually means an influx of new patient admissions.
Couple this with the inevitable staff sickness levels and not forgetting the effects of the latest swine flu epidemic and we have a potential risk of serious staff shortages at many healthcare providers.
Turning patients away or closing beds is sometimes the only answer but it should only be used as a very last resort.
Recent studies have shown that 40% of nurses already believe that patient care is being compromised because of staff shortages on a regular basis.
Similar studies have shown that more than half of nursing staff say they are too busy to provide the level of care they would like and two thirds consider their workload to be too heavy.
This situation leads to increased levels of stress, anxiety and inevitably time off.
Add the fact that many healthcare managers are under pressure to make cuts where they can, into the mix, and the potential for disaster becomes all to evident.
However, use of a nursing agency can alleviate many of these problems.
Most agencies have access to a large bank of well qualified and experienced staff who care available at short notice, making them ideal for covering short term holiday leave and sickness.
Because a nursing agency must be regulated, at least in the UK, and the fact that candidates are vetted extensively by the nursing agency themselves, then the risk of unsuitable candidates is actually lower than if the healthcare organisation had to source them on their own.
On the flip side, many nursing staff find that a nursing agency can offer a wider range of opportunities and more and more staff are warming to the fact that they can gain a wider range of career experience by working for a nursing agency.
Couple this with the inevitable staff sickness levels and not forgetting the effects of the latest swine flu epidemic and we have a potential risk of serious staff shortages at many healthcare providers.
Turning patients away or closing beds is sometimes the only answer but it should only be used as a very last resort.
Recent studies have shown that 40% of nurses already believe that patient care is being compromised because of staff shortages on a regular basis.
Similar studies have shown that more than half of nursing staff say they are too busy to provide the level of care they would like and two thirds consider their workload to be too heavy.
This situation leads to increased levels of stress, anxiety and inevitably time off.
Add the fact that many healthcare managers are under pressure to make cuts where they can, into the mix, and the potential for disaster becomes all to evident.
However, use of a nursing agency can alleviate many of these problems.
Most agencies have access to a large bank of well qualified and experienced staff who care available at short notice, making them ideal for covering short term holiday leave and sickness.
Because a nursing agency must be regulated, at least in the UK, and the fact that candidates are vetted extensively by the nursing agency themselves, then the risk of unsuitable candidates is actually lower than if the healthcare organisation had to source them on their own.
On the flip side, many nursing staff find that a nursing agency can offer a wider range of opportunities and more and more staff are warming to the fact that they can gain a wider range of career experience by working for a nursing agency.
