Innterview Summary NURS FPX 4010 Assessment 2 Attempt 1 Interview and Interdisciplinary Issue Identification

I interviewed my mother, Denise Rundle for this assessment. Denise has been a registered nurse for over 36 years and in this time she has worked in a variety of health care settings in both the U.S. and Canada. As someone with as much experience as she, I couldn’t think of a better candidate to interview for this assessment.

 Denise currently works full-time at a skilled nursing and rehabilitation center in Canada because she has dual citizenship and prefers to spend her summers up North. She is a charge nurse at a facility called Pine Meadows and works both day and night shifts. My mother’s duties as a charge nurse are seemingly endless and include, developing care plans, medication administration, supervising, performing admissions and discharges, skin checks, evaluations, medication reconciliation, appointment scheduling, wound care, entering orders and communicating with patients, family and other members of the interdisciplinary team.

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Several pertinent issues were discussed during the interview, but according to the interviewee, the most concerning matter at Palm Meadows to date, is the staffing shortage. Denise tells me that the only two ways in which management addresses the staffing shortage are by having their nurse managers cover shifts other nurses aren’t available for and by frequently asking nurses to work “double shifts” or overtime.

Denise describes the organizational structure as mostly negative, hailing from burnt-out and overworked employees, yet a united front exists. Denise attests that regardless of any negative feelings employees may have towards the company, that there is still a “we’re in this together”, team-based approach towards patient care. Denise prefers to work the night shift but 

Related assessment NURS FPX 4010 Assessment 3

reminds me that there are pros and cons to working all shifts. The ability to work with an interdisciplinary team on a smaller scale is one of the reasons she prefers to work nights. However, this can also be a drawback because many services and providers are unavailable overnight (Scarborough, V., 2020)

Issue Identification

The staffing shortage at Pine Meadows is the interviewee’s top concern because it jeopardizes patient safety. Typically, nurses in skilled nursing and rehabilitation centers care for a large number of patients to begin with, so having to take on more substantially increases the risk of patient safety, says Denise. A single skilled nursing and rehabilitation nurse on average, is responsible for anywhere between 20 and 32 patients and the nurse-to-patient ratio only grows larger when the unit is understaffed.

To improve patient outcomes, skilled nursing and rehabilitation nurses must adhere to best practices in accordance with their scope of practice and within their unit/department’s regulations