Understaffed Nursing Shift Impacts Patients

March 27, 2015

(Medical Xpress) – Patients exposed to understaffed nursing shifts have a significantly greater chance of suffering conditions such as surgical wound infections, pressure injuries, urinary tract infections and pneumonia. This finding from an Edith Cowan University study that analysed two years of local hospital data involving 36,529 patients. In total, 17,025 (46.6 per cent) were exposed to at least one understaffed shift.