February 11th, 2009
Reports the Times-Tribune:
Claiming patient safety is at stake, Pennsylvania nurses launched a push Tuesday for legislation to set the maximum number of patients under a nurse’s care at any given time at hospitals.
The effort by Service Employees International Union Healthcare Pennsylvania to pass a staffing-ratio law comes several months after the union scored a major victory with a state law banning mandatory overtime work for nurses. The ban takes effect July 1.
The new measure, sponsored by Rep. Tim Solobay, D-48, of Washington County, would set a range of patient nurses working in 17 different hospital units. A nurse in an emergency room would have a 1:3 patient ratio and a nurse in a rehabilitation unit would have a 1:5 patient ratio under the bill, for example. If the bill is passed, a nurse couldn’t be assigned more patients than the ratio.
…
Establishing lower ratios can save lives, reduce medical errors and decrease the length of hospital stays, thus reducing health care costs, said Debb Bonn of Luzerne County, director of the SEIU Nurse Alliance of Pennsylvania.
“Not enough nurses at the bedside increases patient morbidity,” she added. “Not enough nurses at bedside increases medical errors.”
Get more details from the Times-Tribune.
March 15th, 2009 at 2:48 pm
I am definetly excited about this bill being passed. I feel that the bedside is unsafe and patients are not recieving that high quality of care which the desearve. I really have my fingers crossed that this bill will be passed