In health care, pressure to increase salaries and benefits and to improve working conditions comes at a time when reduced revenues make cost containment critical. (Clarke 2000) Also according to Clark (2000), One reason the healthcare industry is behind other employers is that healthcare employers competed only among themselves for nurses and technical staff, and since most healthcare employers offered similar benefits and conditions, competition usually was based on salary. Now the healthcare industry must learn what other employers are doing because they compete with all employers to have the right people in the right place. Leading employers do several things to recruit and retain their quality staff. They listen to staff and allow schedule flexibility to suit families. They also provide options for company stock ownership, award programs, and training. Many healthcare organizations do listen to staff feedback, adjust schedules to meet personal needs, and provide some type company stock ownership. Where healthcare employers often fail is in the area of staff advancement training. In today’s market an employer must to do more then offer a salary and benefits to attract and keep quality staff. The employer must invest in the development of the staff with areas for both professional and personal growth.
Decreasing the Number of Employees Does Not Save Company Money
With all of the chaos the global recession is causing to many industry sectors, it's important to be mindful that we shouldn't rush to judgment, particularly with respect to protecting our bottom line by laying off workers.(Bowes,2009) Focusing to much on payroll and employee costs encourages supervision to operate with inadequate staff levels. This decreases the profit of the company by impacting the quality of both the process and products. While we all know that staffing levels have a major impact on a company's costs, we often don't realize that staffing levels also have a huge impact on quality, both production or process quality as well as customer-service quality. (Bowes, 2009) So even if your staff has excellent costumer service if there are not enough of them to do the job in a timely manner you will lose profit. Not only does low staffing affect profits but it also causes other issues specific to health care.
Specific Issues Found in Healthcare
The high defect rate in health care translates into large numbers of preventable patient injuries and deaths because of unsafe heath care practices. There has been recent research suggesting that the situation has not improved despite improvement efforts (HealthGrades, 2004). Many researchers within hospitals have found a link between workforce issues and the quality of care provided; for example, 24% of sentinel events reported to the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations were linked to staffing issues (JCAHO, 2001). It is a simple conclusion that workforce issues effect quality of the clinical care provided to patients. When the U.S. health care system began using the diagnosis-related groups (DRG) system in the 1980s hospital reimbursement was reduced. Hospitals began looking for ways to cut costs by layoffs, decreased training and freezing wages. These events caused diminished motivation, and created less job contentment with in the workforce, resulting in increased staff turnover. Now fewer people are entering the health care professions causing reduced skill available to fill the vacant positions. Evidence is now documenting that these spiral effect forces have led to worsened care, lowered patient satisfaction, and caused poor cost performance. Before long, the organization is caught in a death spiral of workforce instability. (Gelinas, Loh, 2004)
In conclusion health care organizations must have a strong human resource management program that develops, manages, motivates, maintains and retains quality professional staff.
With the current increase in unemployment it can be a challenge to find the right mix of skill and competency to fill vacant positions with in the health care professions. One of the main factors that affect an organization’s recruitment of these quality employees is the need to invest in the development of the staff with areas for both professional and personal growth. Once you have the staff and have invested in them you need to keep them on the job because even if they have excellent costumer service if there are not enough of them to do the job in a timely manner you will lose profit. And finally workforce issues effect quality of the clinical care provided to patients creating unsafe health care practices.
References
Barbara Bowes. (2009, March 14). Staffing by numbers Cutting payroll doesn't always pay off. Winnipeg Free Press, G.2. Retrieved April 15, 2010, from Canadian Newsstand Complete. (Document ID: 1660775941).
HealthGrades. (2004). Patient safety in American hospitals. Retrieved April 15, 2010, from
Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations. (2001). Front line of defense: The role of nurses in preventing sentinel events. Oakbrook Terrace, IL: Joint Commission Resources.
Lillee S Gelinas, & David Yik-Hin Loh. (2004). The Effect of Workforce Issues on Patient Safety. Nursing Economics, 22(5), 266-72, 279. Retrieved April 15, 2010, from ProQuest Medical Library. (Document ID: 721772021).
Richard L Clarke. (2000, February). Investing in the human resource. Healthcare Financial Management, 54(2), 16. Retrieved April 15, 2010, from ABI/INFORM Global. (Document ID: 48476896).
