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Discussion #7 – Productivity Analysis

Questions 1& 2

Month	Actual Patient Days	Budgeted Patient Days	Actual Nursing Hours	Budgeted Nursing Hours	Productivity Measures	Variance
January	1,116	1,116	10,965	10,044	10	0
February	1,030	1,008	10,209	9,074	10	0
March	974	896	8,060	8,064	8	0
April	876	960	8,560	8,640	9.7	0
May	930	868	7,739	7,812	8.3	0
June	864	840	7,553	7,560	8.7	0
July	942	868	7,840	7,812	8.3	0
August	831	868	7,993	7,812	9.6	0
September	888	840	7,868	7,560	8.8	0
October	967	868	8,013	7,812	8.2	0
November	996	960	8,642	8,640	8.6	0
December	1,091	896	10,238	8,064	9.3	0
Total	11,505	10,988	103,680	98,894	107.5	0

3. Discuss the trends you see in this data from month to month, but also for each quarter and the overall year.

The trends for this unit month to month are very similar. The variance trends are all the same if the productivity standard is 9 hours per patient day. The trend for actual patient days varies month-to-month. The winter months are higher for actual patient days which makes sense because patients tend to have sicker days in the winter. The first and fourth quarter have higher actual patient days and actual nursing hours. The actual nursing hours reflect the higher patient days due to the amount of nursing hours needed to care for the higher number of patients. The overall year trend seems to be fairly, equal between actual and budgeted patient days and nursing hours.

4. How can this information be used by the nurse manager to budget more efficiently for the upcoming year? What are your suggestions for change?

This information can be used for the nurse manager of this unit to budget more efficiently for the upcoming year by budgeting more nursing hours to cover for the increase of patient days. This will cut down on overtime for the nurses on this unit. If nurses are not needed for particular shifts, some nurses can get canceled, pushed-back or flexed, and called in if needed to cover the patient load.

5. If you were the nursing manager, what other information might you request to better calculate productivity in your unit?

As a nursing manager I would request, and take into consideration, the education levels of nurses on my unit, the amount of monthly patient returns to inpatient status, the nurses on the unit that are full-time, part-time, prn, and agency. Patient outcome and quality patient care should be considered when scheduling nursing staff and budgeting nursing hours. The amount of qualified nursing staff caring for patients, is correlated with patient outcomes, patient mortality, and positive patient rescue (Paulsen, 2018). Productivity is important for all units, however, patient safety and patient outcomes are also important.

References

Paulsen, R.A. (2018). Taking nurse staffing research to the unit level. Nursing Management,

49(7), 42-48. doi: 10.1097/01.NUMA.0000538915.53159.b5