Staffing

Education: Staffing/Skill Mix

Skill Mix and Outcome Analysis

Additional work is being done to extend the work released in 1997 as the study, "ANA Implementing Nursing's Report Card: A Study of RN Staffing, Length of Stay and Patient Outcomes." This study examined the feasibility of conducting a secondary data analysis of existing large data sets to determine relationships between nursing skill mix, length of stay and nursing's quality indicators in hospital settings. The methodology tested in that study is being used to review data from the original three states (NY, MA, CA) plus three more states (FL, VA, FL) and for two more years. It is anticipated that the study will be completed by the end of 1999.

On April 1, 1998, ANA convened a panel of experts in staffing to begin work to develop a set of principles to guide nurse staffing decisions. The principles address staffing considerations at the individual, unit and organizational level. A brochure with the principles, Principles for Nurse Staffing, and an annotated bibliography, Principles for Nurse Staffing with Annotated Biography (ANA, 1999), have been published and are available through American Nurses Publishing. In December 1998, the ANA Board of Directors appointed a staff nurse advisory committee to develop an implementation and dissemination plan for these materials. That Advisory Committee continues its work. American Nurses Association

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