Patient Ratio Laws, Careful what you Wish For.

I'm seeing it more and more with hospitals crying about the lack of money.
This time it is the Nursing Assistants taking a hit, by being given a larger number of patients to care for, or cut all together.
I first noticed this at Kaiser Hospitals in California when they pulled most or all the nursing assistants from the floors, and made the nurses do total care for the patients, all in order to save a few dollars. I think it was also a little retaliation, because California nurses pushed and got laws passed for the number of patients they could care for at one time. However, talking to travel nurses it is happening in other states also.

This is just a bad business model and another reason patients are not satisfied. As a nurse you get trapped into making decisions between patients that you should not have to make. When I should be helping a fresh post-op patient with pain control and getting settled, instead I am making sure my confused, unstable and impulsive 88 yr old man is not falling out of bed because he thinks he needs the bathroom.

I love a good nursing assistant and jump to help them when I can, but in reality it is the patients suffering as they wait long to be fed, transported or cleaned.

To all you hospital bean counters who think of money before patients