Nurse Working Long Hours Essay

According to Rogers, Wei-Ting, Scott, Aiden, & Dinges, (2004) working long extended helped the shortage of nurses with so many leaving because of this one fact. With nurses constantly being on call and working extended shifts it not only effects the nurse involved but the wellbeing of the patient as well. Logbooks completed by approximately three hundred ninety-five staff members revealed that forth percent of a nurse’s work shift exceeded twelve hours at least twice a week. There are several risks for nurses to constantly working excessive hours. The many risks that come along with working long excessive hours include, but are not limited to, significantly making more errors due to the laws of rest, poorly written reports, and a lower

With nurses working long hours it is not known for sure what the true effects are on critically ill patients. To gain a better understanding of recurring work patterns that connect to patient care nurses are uniting to discuss ways to lessen hours and provide better care. Data has been collected from a random sample of nurses working in trauma areas as well as emergency rooms around the United States of America. The data collected included total hours worked, the time of day working, overtime hours, and time to sleep, as well as sleep patterns. As this information was studied, it was found that longer work duration increased the risk of recurring errors and initial errors. It also showed the detectable decrease in the nurse’s ability to pay close attention to their patients and all the important details of the patient’s care. According to the Institute of Medicine recommendations there have been findings to minimize the use of twelve hour shifts and limit nurses to few overtime hours. This will help decrease the number of errors being made in patient care. They also recommend that there should be no more that twelve consecutive hours worked during a twenty-four-hour time