The American Nurses Association: A Healthy Work Environment

A healthy work environment is very important in the healthcare field. The American Nurses Association (ANA) (2017), states that it is not only important to maintain the health and safety for patients, but for the health care providers as well. As a nurse in this ever-changing healthcare field, it is very important to be healthy. ANA defines a healthy nurse as one who creates and maintains a healthy mind, body, and soul (Carpenter, 2015). A healthy nurse is very caring and compassionate, maintains self-care, and is a great role model and educator (Carpenter, 2015). A healthy nurse must have a healthy and safe work environment. A healthy work environment must have effective policies and procedures and be safe (Carpenter, 2015). The ANA has done a lot of work in the following work environment areas: safe patient handling and mobility, safe needles, fatigue, safe staffing, immunizations, and incivility, bullying, and workplace violence (Carpenter, 2015).

I have a great leadership team that supports the staff and keeps my unit up-to-date with the best practices. My unit does a great job maintaining a high moral by offering staffing perks, monthly kudos emails, and monthly unit events. Our staffing ratios are safe, which improves the overall care our patients receive. If I had to choose one work environment issue that affects my unit, it would be fatigue. There are many forms of fatigue in my unit which include: compassion fatigue, physical fatigue, and alarm