Impact of Nurse Staffing on Hospital Cost
Previous studies demonstrated that significant cost reductions were possible through effective staff management. Increasing the proportion of hours provided by RNs would yield cost savings resulting from avoiding death and reduced LOS. Many studies encouraged reducing costs by increasing the caring activities of RNs. Although increasing the number of RNs was positively related to increasing hospital expenditures, it did not affect hospital profit significantly. In contrast, greater non-registered nurse hours led not only to higher hospital expenditures but also lower profits (McCue et al., 2003). An interaction effect among nurse staffing, cost of care, and efficiency of nursing care was noted. Three studies suggested that cost reductions were possible by increasing RN nursing hours. They stressed that higher RN nursing hours would contribute to improved patient outcomes, especially nosocomial infection, pneumonia, and other medical complications, while in turn decreasing costs of patient care. The results of these studies reflected the fact that higher RN nursing hours contributed to the improvement of patient safety and efficiency, thereby reducing the LOS and the cost of care in the long term.