Introduction
In many countries, the shortage of nurses remains a challenging issue. My current workplace, Oroville Hospital, grapples with the same matter in attempts to offer care commensurate to patient’s anticipations. Therefore, there is an urgent need to review and manage the situation for an enhanced rendition of excellent services. Oroville Hospital has a critical catchment population, where it offers medical care to individuals within this society and surrounding community, triggering an urgent demand for action (Oroville Hospital, 2019). However, the geographical location of this area, distance, and the program capacity impact the recruiting and retaining of employees. The task force needs to create and institutionalize plans for sustaining a healthy and conducive workforce. Additionally, the team will be charged with diverse inter-professional collaboration to establish findings that will help develop a report presented to the board. The purpose, benefits, target population, interprofessional collaboration, cost implication, and the recommended evaluation approach for the quality improvement initiative are presented in the analysis.
Purpose
The task force will identify and address the healthcare workers’ shortage in the Oroville Hospital. Part of their scope is to define the problem and develop recommendations to address this pressing matter. The objective seeks to align with the overall core mandate of the health care facility that visions to offer unmatched patient care needs (Nunes et al., 2020). Reversal of this negative trend resonates with the need to improve customer satisfaction.
Target Audience
The target population, in general, is to determine the needs of a growing community and the lack of new recruitments in the field of care. The audience will be to present to the board for acknowledgment and to create a plan that can be adopted by the task force. Recommendations beyond that would be to include policymakers and community leaders to become involved in the effort.
The Benefits
The benefits of this task force will be to gain data that supports and provides evidence of the problem. It also seeks to come up with recommendations on specific topics, such as barriers, population growth, inadequate healthcare workers to fulfill the demand, competitive recruitment, the application process, curriculum, salaries, and working conditions (Perfetto, 2019). Other expected benefits will include expansion and capacity in rural areas.
Interprofessional Collaboration
Regarding interprofessional collaboration, the task force shall have a team of about 10 to 20 people. The members can be drawn from multi-disciplinary orientations encompassing health care, the community, occupational health specialist, nurse manager, certified medical assistant, a physician, and Human Resources Director (Ahmed & Carmody, 2020). The group will be expected to meet eight times for six months to develop a balanced approach to the issue for solutions. Members are expected to research outside of the scheduled meetings.
Budget Justification
The task force’s cost is limited to stipends for the meeting dates, supplies, transportation, per diem, and the fee for a secretary/recorder or administrative assistant. The team will be made up of volunteers; however, some costs will be reimbursed if approved before the expense. Therefore, the estimated budget shall be under $150,000 with full accountability guaranteed. The budget for implementation of the recommendations is undetermined at this time.
Evaluation
The evaluation basis shall be produced and documented in a form that includes the following categories:
- Strategies
- Recommendations
- Request for funding
- Donations
- Source/owner
Conclusion
In conclusion, this task force’s work shall be to collaborate efforts of many stakeholders. The impact will be based on the quality of the recommendations and the projected nursing shortage if no action is taken. In the spirit of the Oroville Hospital, the number one priority is the safety, health, and quality of life for the workforce, the community of Oroville, and the immediate surrounding.
References
Ahmed, H., & Carmody, J. B. (2020). On the looming physician shortage and strategic expansion of graduate medical education. Cureus, 12(7).
Nunes, F. G., Robert, G., Weggelaar-Jansen, A. M., Wiig, S., Aase, K., Karltun, A., & Fulop, N. J. (2020). Enacting quality improvement in ten European hospitals: A dualities approach. BMC Health Services Research, 20(1), 1-16.
Quality & safety. (n.d.). Oroville Hospital.
Perfetto, L. M. (2019). Determining the rate of educational advancement of associate degree nursing graduates: A replicable method to establish the ADN as a pathway to the baccalaureate in nursing. Teaching and Learning in Nursing, 14(2), 77-84.