Nursing: Safety at Workplace - Essay Example

"Nursing: Safety at Workplace" is a wonderful example of a paper on care.
Nursing is considered to be a hazardous occupation in the healthcare industry. With the aid of recent researches, it has been viewed that there exist numerous issues within the healthcare industries that act as a barrier in the nursing profession. One such major issue within the clinical environment is safety at the workplace (The White House, n.d.). The main objective of this paper is thus to propose a well-defined plan that would help in mitigating the issue related to safety at the workplace.

Explanation of the setting and/or context in which nursing problem is observed

There exist several stressors within the nursing environment that can produce injuries and diseases to the professionals. The key safety issue that has been viewed affecting the working life of a nurse in a clinical environment mainly includes needle stick injuries, workplace violence, and musculoskeletal injuries from patient handling. Working overtime and extreme job stress are also considered to be other major issues in the clinical environment. These forms of issues are mainly faced in situations where the nurses mainly focus on the health of an individual and the population simultaneously, especially in the public healthcare sector (Castro, Cabrera, Gee, Fujishiro & Tagalog, 2009).

A detailed description of the problem, issue, or educational deficit provided

It is considered that every nurse, irrespective of his/her domain, faces ethical challenges in their working life. However, public healthcare nurses are considered to be more prone to such issues. Safety in the workplace is therefore considered to be one of the vital aspects that many nurses in the public sector experience. The topic of safety at the workplace for the nurse has been a major issue in the public healthcare sector resulting from harassment allegedly practiced by the top-level management along with other job-related issues (Canadian Nurses Association, 2006).

Impact of the problem on the work environment and patient outcomes described

The impact of the growing safety issues has not only affected the nursing industry to a great extent but has also evidenced the slow growth rate of the nursing profession. Work-related stress is considered to play a significant role in maintaining a balanced retention rate in any industry. It has been measured in this respect that there has been a decrease of 21.1% in the total numbers of nurses in 2005 resulting from the growing safety issues in the clinical environment in the United States (Runy, 2013).

Significance to the nursing profession discussed

The growing safety issues have also been in discussion amidst many critics. It is considered to be a vital issue as it has resulted in decreasing the nurse retention rate in the clinical environment over the years. Thus, prior measurements should be adapted to mitigate such issues as safety at the workplace plays a significant role to help an employee perform better (Runy, 2013).

The solution to the problem identified

The safety issues like workplace discrimination and harassment from the supervisors along with long working hours are resulting in the creation of more issues in the healthcare industry for nurses, commonly resulting in excessive job stress. In this respect, the healthcare industry should implement new policies and strategies that would decrease work overload amid the nurses and also preserve their safety from harassment within the workplace. The organization can also install new technological equipment and can conduct ethical classes to generate awareness among the professionals and mitigate the issue (The American Nurses Association, Inc., 2013).

Conclusion

The clinical environment is considered to be one of the most complex working environments that require adequate and regular surveillance. Nurses are considered to be a vital part of any clinical environment; however, growing issues like sexual harassment and discrimination practices at the workplace are creating a barrier for the nurses to work in a healthy clinical setting. With reference to the above discussion, it can be concluded that since nursing is considered to be an important profession, implementing policies like ethical classes and due significance to the work-life balance of nurses would be useful in mitigating the issue.