ABSENTEEISM

Absenteeism and Patient Care



Absenteeism and Patient Care

Introduction

Absenteeism, in its literal meaning refers to unscheduled absences. In the field of health care, absenteeism refers to the absence of medical staff particularly nurses which leads to the continual strain and affects the quality of the health care services received by the patients. Absenteeism also affects the ability of the organizations for effective dealing of the challenges posed by the environmental factors and has a devastating effect on the functioning of a health care organization. In proper functioning of a hospital, out-patient clinic or any health care organization, the availability of sufficient number of nurses is essential for delivering of quality care services to the patients. The role of nurses forms the backbone of the any health care institution or health care delivery system. Adequate number of nursing staff is necessary for the proper addressing of the health and care needs of any community and country as well.

The major challenges faced by the absenteeism of nursing staff and the phenomenon of absenteeism are not new challenge faced by healthcare systems (Sullivan & Decker, 1992, pp. 389). The profession of nursing is regarded as an inherent demanding patient, which is focused more on the patient than the provider of health care services. The duty of nursing staff is to extent the quality care services to the patients without sufficient support from the managerial staff. This forms the basis of the stemming of factors that causes the phenomenon of absenteeism and affects their morale. These factors include stress at the workplace, and the pressure faced by nursing staff at workplace. Health care organizations of many countries face the challenges and problems associated with the absenteeism of nurses. The absence of the nursing staff also results from lower satisfactory level associated with the working conditions, personal reasons, unfairness and the way of management of the organization delivering patient care services.

The escalation of absenteeism can lead to the smooth running of a health care organization and severe negative impact on the quality of the patient care services delivered by the organization. Many studies have point out inadequate and poor monitoring and record maintaining approaches incorporated in the healthcare institutions for absenteeism of the staff at workplace. This has led to a belief that frequent absence of nursing staff can be tolerated unless it causes interruption in the work schedules. This assessment analyzes the primary reasons behind the absence of the nursing staff from the health care institutions and their affects on the quality of the patient care services delivered by the institution. Also, this paper will present a strategy to effectively cope with the absenteeism of nursing staff at workplace and shall present the associated outcomes.

Discussion

Background to the Problem

Absenteeism is considered responsible for disrupting the environment of health care institution, affecting the morale of the employees and producing staffing instability. Staffing instability created by the absenteeism further contributes in the lowering of cohesion among the nursing staff, lowering their collaboration with physicians thereby creating difficulties in ...