Discuss The Factors Leading To Nurse Shortage In Mental Health Clinic (Research Paper Sample)

Nursing Shortage in Mental Health Clinic
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Nursing Shortage in Mental Health Clinic
Introduction
There is an alarming shortage of nurses in the United States, a situation that threatens patient safety and quality of nursing care in the country’s healthcare facilities. The nurse deficit compromises the overall public health because of the low nurse to patient ratio. Sadly, there are slim chances of reversing the trend because there are not enough efforts to encourage young people into the profession. Strategies to attract more youths into nursing, particularly psychiatry, include offering better salaries, improved work environments, public recognition, and offsetting the stigmatization of mental illness (Health Care Insights , 2016). With a special interest in the impact of psychiatric nurse shortage, with the right attitude among learners, social structures, and government input, more people will develop interest in nursing and psychiatry. As a result, this will set the stage to offset the nurse shortage problem not only in psychiatry, but also in other specialties.
Context: Mental Health Clinic Setting
Psychiatric or mental health nursing is the nursing specialty that deals with nursing care for patients with mental problems and disorders. Therefore, professionals in this specialty work with individuals, families, communities, and groups to assess and manage their mental needs and conditions. A psychiatric mental nurse, therefore, has the role to develop, nursing diagnosis, implement the nursing care processes, and evaluate them for effectiveness. Besides, advanced practice nurses in the specialty offer primary mental healthcare services by assessing, diagnosing, and treating people with psychiatric (Psychiatric-Mental Health Nurses, 2016). The specialty, therefore, requires nurses to apply therapeutic skills in the administration of psychotherapy and prescription of medication among others. A review of the roles of mental health practitioners reveals that working in the mental health clinic setting is a fascinating but exhausting experience that requires one to accommodate diversity while serving unpredictable and prone-to-violence mental patients.
The Nurse Shortage Challenge
While appreciating the significance of psychiatric nursing, it is necessary to review the consequences and impact of the nursing shortage on the specialty. Literature review suggests that the problem of nurse shortage reached crisis levels as early as in 2009. The shortage of registered nurses, however, translates to limited access to healthcare for people with nursing care needs such as psychiatric problems (Hanrahan, Aiken, McClaine, & Hanlon, 2010). One of the factors contributing to the shortage of nurses is the aging of baby boomers, which has seen many nurses quitting the practice. Also, as more of the baby boomers are leaving the practice, the demand for nursing care continues to escalate with the rising aging population. Besides, chronic conditions are prevalent among the ages; hence, they use healthcare services more than any other group (Health Care Insights, 2016).
Psychiatric nursing suffers deficiency of nurses because many nursing students shun from the specialty. The disregard for psychiatric nursing among many students is attributed to the stigma that mental health patients are unpredictable, prone to violent, and partially responsible for their conditions (Hanrahan, Aiken, McClaine, & Hanlon, 2010). Due to misconceptions and stereotyping by the society, nursing students’ choices of specialties are influenced to the detriment of the mental health specialty. Resultantly, there are only a limited number of nurse graduates ready to practice in mental health clinics because of the negative attitudes towards the specialty. The lack sufficient psychiatric nurse trainees in the pipeline, and thus, the system are unable to keep balance and pace with the large number of retiring nurses (Health Care Insights, 2016).
Impact of the Nurse Shortage Challenge
The shortage of nurses in all specialties has dire consequences since the practicing nurses work under stressful conditions. Cases of burnout, fatigue, job dissatisfaction, and accidents leading to injuries become prevalent; as a result, nurses are unable to deliver the required quality of care. Nurses working under these terrible conditions are prone to making medical errors and mistakes that compromise patient safety because the quality of care deteriorates when one is overworked. Consequently, several preventable complicati...