Report: Nurse shortage hurts patient care—Problem in Nevada one of the worst in nation

Thursday, May 10, 2001 | 10:09 a.m.

Nurses in Nevada say understaffing is compromising patient care, according to a union-commissioned report scheduled to be released today.

In a survey of 237 nurses in Nevada, 66 percent said more than half the errors they report in hospitals are a result of inadequate staffing, according to the report commissioned by the Service Employees International Union Nurse Alliance.

The Institute of Medicine in 1999 reported that medical errors were responsible for between 44,000 and 98,000 deaths in the nation's hospitals each year. The union, which represents nurses nationwide, was to present findings on the link between understaffing and medical errors during the Nevada State Board of Nursing monthly meeting in Reno today.

The report was compiled for the union by the Feldman Group of Washington, D.C.

"Extensive telephone interviews were conducted with a nationally representative sample of 800 registered nurses, as well as over-samples in six states," according to the executive summary of the report, titled, "The Shortage of Care -- A Study by the SEIU Nurse Alliance."

Findings include:

* 46 percent of Nevada nurses polled say at least once a week patients on their units experienced missed or delayed medicine or treatments.

* 64 percent of Nevada nurses report at least once a week they do not have the time to provide the necessary training and education for patients.

* 40 percent of Nevada nurses say at least once a week they lack the time to assess and monitor their patients' conditions.

Gay Hayward, the national coordinator of the SEIU Nurses Alliance, said Wednesday that Nevada's results mirrored findings in other states about the relationship between inadequate staffing and an increase in medical errors.

Nevada's shortage is one of the nation's most severe, Hayward said. Nursing schools in the state turn out about 200 graduates each year, but there are currently more than 500 job openings in the Las Vegas area alone, Hayward said.

Dee Hicks, chief nursing officer at Sunrise Hospital and a critical care nurse for 13 years, urged caution in reviewing the SEIU findings; the poll sampled just 237 of the state's estimated 7,000 nurses.

Hicks, who has worked at Sunrise for nearly 32 years, said she personally hasn't seen a correlation between medical errors and understaffing.

Nurses gathered Wednesday in Washington, D.C., in an attempt to raise awareness of understaffing concerns. They set out hundreds of pairs of unfilled nursing shoes on the steps of the Capitol to highlight the point.

Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., promised to support legislation to ease the shortage.

"Our nurses are being forced to work too many hours of overtime," Reid said in a press release Wednesday. "Mandatory overtime should not be used as a substitute for adequate nurse staffing levels. We set limits on the number of hours airline pilots, air traffic controllers, train engineers and truck drivers can work before their fatigue reaches hazardous levels. We should do the same for nurses who are responsible for critically ill patients."

Reid plans planned to announce two pieces of legislation today -- the first would provide education and training for nurses; the second would require hospitals that accept federal funding to post nurse-to-patient ratios.

Legislation to ease the nursing crunch has been suggested at the state level as well, including a bill by Assemblywoman Vivian Freeman, D-Washoe, who is a retired registered nurse. Assembly Bill 378 would set aside a portion of the tobacco settlement-funded state Millennium Scholarships for people seeking careers in nursing.