Law and Legislation in Advance Practice Nursing Essay Paper
Law and Legislation in Advance Practice Nursing Essay Paper
Research a Health- care Initiative or Legislative statue that is currently underway in California and federally. You may want to check with nursing organization that have legislative departments that can provide their analysis on current health issues. Conduct online research to identify current issue. Discuss how you can take an active role as a healthcare Advocate ( at the local, state or federal level as appropriate). Identify one tactic to advocate for your identified initiatives or legislation.
Law and Legislation in Advance Practice Nursing
Research a Health- care Initiative or Legislative statue that is currently underway in California and federally. You may want to check with nursing organization that have legislative departments that can provide their analysis on current health issues. Conduct online research to identify current issue.
A health care initiative that is currently underway in California and federally is nurse-to-patient safe staffing ratios. California is the only state in the USA that has passed legislation requiring a specific nurse-to-patient ratio in every hospital unit. For instance, California legislation requires that an intensive care unit have one nurse for every two patients, and the emergency room have one nurse for every four patients. These law-mandated ratios were passed in 2003 and have helped to ease the existing nurse staff shortage while reducing errors and protecting the safety of nurses and patients (Associated Press, 2021; Livanos, 2018). Law and Legislation in Advance Practice Nursing Essay Paper
While California passed laws on minimum nurse-to-patient ratios, debate is still ongoing over the debate for these laws. The federal legislators continue to debate on this issue that pits professional nursing organizations against hospital organizations and employers. Even as evidence from California mounts suggesting that minimum nurse-to-patient ratios would improve patient safety, reduce errors and ease the nurse staffing shortage, the debate continues with significant opposition to such laws being passed at the federal level citing cost concerns (Lavinos, 2018).
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With the current state of affairs and in the absence of a federal mandate regulating the number of patients that a nurse can care for at one time in hospital, nurses are consistently forced into a situation where they end up caring for more patients than is safe thereby compromising patient care and negatively impacting care outcomes. Every patient deserves to receive high quality care and safe staffing would ensure that this is achieved by protecting patients from complications arising from missed care such as infections, health care disparities, medical errors and so much more. Passing the legislation at the federal level would improve care and protect patients by setting minimum, mandated, nurse-to-patient staffing ratios (National Nurses United, 2020).
Discuss how you can take an active role as a healthcare Advocate (at the local, state or federal level as appropriate).
Taking an active role on the issue of nurse-to-patient ratios is an ethical responsibility of nurses as health care advocates, and at the core of the nursing profession. The public and legislators may lack essential information that they need to make informed choices about the issue. This vulnerability is the key reason for nurse advocacy with efforts expended to champion social justice to ensure that every persons has access to the health care they need. At the federal level, a nurse acting as a health care advocate would approach the issue as one involving policy change. In this case, the nurse leverages professional expertise to influence legislators and other interest groups to support the policy change. This includes using knowledge of the legislative process, participating in legislative actions and coalitions, contacting and meeting with legislators, and providing expert testimony to legislative committees to help inform their policy decisions (Loversidge & Zurmehly, 2019).
Identify one tactic to advocate for your identified initiatives or legislation.
An advocacy tactic that nurses can apply is social action. Although the issue has received much attention, it faces significant opposition with large power imbalances among the stakeholders, serious conflicts of interests among the affected parties, and strong disagreements over the nature of the problem. As such, value-based allegiances come into play in debates concerning the issue with any advocacy activity likely to turn partisan, taking on the appearance of a crusade. In this case, the social action would involve the nurse contacting the legislators and persuading them to support the policy change, enlisting the aid of media to bring attention to the issue and how the policy would present overall benefits, contacting and enlisting the support of other nurses and health professionals, lobbying for stronger policy, speaking at meetings on the issue, and helping to organize demonstrations and rallies. For that matter, applying this tactic focuses on placing the legislators under pressure to take a side on the issue and get actively involved in making the required policy changes. This social action tactic is perceived as the nurses asserting legitimate rights with supporters of the policy change considered allies in a social justice cause. The effort applied in considered conspiratorial, emotional and passionate, with conflict being inevitable as strong interests are involved (Milstead & Short, 2019).
References
Associated Press (2021, January 8). California bypasses nurses staffing ratio rules amid virus surge. https://www.modernhealthcare.com/providers/california-bypasses-nurse-staffing-ratio-rules-amid-virus-surge
Livanos, N. (2018). A Broadening Coalition: Patient Safety Enters the Nurse-to-Patient Ratio Debate. Journal of Nursing Regulation, 9(1), 68-70. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2155-8256(18)30056-5
Loversidge, J. M., & Zurmehly, J. (2019). Evidence-informed health policy: using EBP to transform nursing and healthcare. Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society of Nursing.
Milstead, J. & Short, N. (2019). Health Policy and Politics: A Nurse’s Guide (6th ed.). Jones & Bartlett Learning.
National Nurses United (2020). National Campaign for Safe RN-to-Patient Staffing Ratios. https://www.nationalnursesunited.org/ratios
