In another article related to nursing shortage, a survey was conducted by the Online Journal of Issues in Nursing (OJIN) to identify the perceived experiences of Registered Nurse with clinical errors and whether the errors had any relation to the nursing shortage. Ludwick and Silva (2003) report that the study was also aimed at identifying whether the nurses had any moral distress after the incidents.
The survey was also aimed at identifying whether the RNs perceived that other nurses made clinical errors and whether these errors were related to the nursing shortage and if the errors resulted in any kind of moral distress for the nurses involved. The participants of the study were drawn from hospitals the world over. The survey was posted to the home page of OJIN to capture the attention of potential participants. The research instrument was a 72 item questionnaire.
The survey had eleven categories of errors (Ludwick and Silva, 2003). One of the categories involved injuries to nurses on the job while the other ten categories were clinical errors involving patients. The participants were asked whether they a) had experienced the clinical errors or incidents (yes or no), b if the incidents/ errors had caused them to have any moral distress (no, some, strong), c) if the incidents/errors had any relation to the nursing shortage (no, strongly, somewhat) (Ludwick and Silva, 2003).
Due to the fact that nurses work with other nurses closely, the survey also had parallel questions that were asked to find out if, a) study participants had any awareness of other nurses who had experienced any of the 11 categories (yes/no), the clinical errors of the nurses were related to the shortage (no, strongly, somewhat), the clinical errors of other nurses led to moral distress among the study participants (no, strongly, some) (Ludwick and Silva, 2003).
The variables in the study were nursing shortage and moral distress (independent variables), clinical errors (dependent variable). The reliability and validity of the study was not very high as the study participants were generally self-selected. This makes generalization of the study findings difficult. The self-selection process also means that it was difficult to guarantee that the actual participants were actually Registered Nurses.
The fact that the RN participants were required to answer parallel questions about other nurses is also a possible limitation for the study. The researchers themselves identify that there was underepresentation of diploma educated nurses. Additionally, statistical assumptions cannot be made about the association between clinical errors and nursing shortage and moral distress.
This is because the data collected was mostly analyzed using percentages and frequency counts, thus the study generated questions for further research about the concepts that it was exploring.
References
Alexander P, Leddy K, Drain M and Kaldenberg D, 2009, State Nursing Shortages and Patient Satisfaction: More RNs-Better Patient Experiences, Journal of Nursing Care Quality vol 22, no 2, pp 119-127 Barney SM, 2004, The Impact of Nursing Care and Other Healthcare Attributes on Hospitalized Patient Satisfaction and Behavioral Intentions, Journal of Healthcare http://www.allbusiness.com/