Policy Implications of Nurse Staffing Legislation

Nurse Staffing and Health Outcomes of Psychiatric Inpatients: A Secondary Analysis of National Health Insurance Claims Data

“…RN proportion, one of the system characteristics, was only adjusted in the multilevel Model C. This is because the relationship between the RN proportion and the nursing staff-to-adjusted inpatient ratio was tolerable, while the RN proportion was closely correlated with the RN-to-inpatient ratio and the RN-toadjusted inpatient ratio. However, when comparing the current nursing staff-to-adjusted inpatient ratio with Japanese legal standards for the number of psychiatric beds [8,9], only tertiary hospitals showed a similar staffing level (3.56). The U.S. nurse staffing standard (i.e., California legal standard) is expressed as the licensed nurse-to-patient ratio during one shift [7].…”

“…This standard is considered insufficient to ensure adequate nurse staffing in comparison with standards elsewhere. For example, in the US state of California licensed nurse-to-patient ratio during one shift for acute psychiatric wards is 1:6 [7], while in Japan the employed nurse-to-inpatient ratios for the number of psychiatric beds are 1:3 or 1:4 [8,9]. Therefore, it is essential to identify associations between nurse staffing and health outcomes among psychiatric inpatients in order to review and revise legal standards in Korea.…”

Video Recording of Nursing Care Activities in Gerontological Nursing to Compare General Units and Comprehensive Nursing Care Units

“…In Japan, specialized nurses who assess nursing needs and the patient severity continuously evaluate in the nursing unit, and promptly respond to situations that require greater nursing needs by adjusting the nurse staffing. For example, they might designate a higher number of nurses in a week with greater nursing needs due to factors such as patient fluctuation or patient severity [29,30]. Strategies for efficient management such as variations in nurse staffing must also be investigated in Korea in order to reduce job stress and demand among nurse staff and to improve both the inpatient satisfaction and patient safety.…”