Healthy Work Environment Analysis

Introduction I am very fortunate to have worked over 17 years in the nursing profession. I currently work in the Critical Care Unit at Hendrick Medical Center in Abilene, Texas. Recently, I have become concerned with the legislative impact on health care policies and I am writing in regards to the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN) Healthy Work Environments Initiative. Given your background in the nursing profession, I know you will be able to sympathize with the unhealthy work environments some nurses must face and the negative impact it has on patient safety and workplace errors. The AACN has identified a major area for improvement and this organization encourages nurses to play a role in developing and promoting healthy

In addition, nursing turnover has been reported to range from 15-36% per year, a much higher rate than other health care professionals. Several professional organizations in nursing have identified and established criteria for a healthy workplace. As a result, the 8 Essential Attributes of a Healthy Work Environment was developed to reflect what staff nurses perceive to be the key to a healthy workplace. Examples of a few of the 8 essentials are supportive nurse managers, adequate staffing and a culture in which concern for patients is paramount. Evidence has shown that all 8 essentials are positively correlated and therefore all 8 need to be addressed by the improvement strategies. Currently there is not a health care policy in place either requiring medical facilities to incorporate the 8 essentials into their systems or formally recognizing those that

Research has shown that safe patient care is directly related to the quality of the staff nurse’s work environments and favorable conditions optimize patient safety, improve staff’s physical and mental wellbeing, and increase retention, while decreasing burnout, turnover, and job stress of the workforce. Achieving health work environments requires baseline perception of the staff nurses’ current workplace, implementation of improvement strategies, and confirmation of the success of those strategies by unit nurses. Stakeholder Analysis The Healthy Work Environment Initiative will directly affect everyone who enters any health care facility. The AACN standards have raised the bar for work environments in healthcare and made it clear that excellence is an ongoing journey that ultimately benefits patients, families, and those who care for them. Healthy work environments are essential to ensure patient safety, enhance staff recruitment and retention, and maintain an organization’s financial viability.