Reference no: EM133796106

Question

You are a staff nurse on a small telemetry unit. The unit is staffed at a ratio of one nurse for every four patients, and the charge nurse is counted in this staffing. There is also a full-time unit secretary and monitor technician to assist at the desk. The charge nurse is responsible for making the daily staffing assignments. Although you recognize that the charge nurse needs to reduce her patient care assignment to perform the charge nurse duties, you have grown increasingly frustrated that she normally assigns herself only one patient, if any, and these patients always have the lowest acuity level on the floor. This has placed a disproportionate burden on the other nurses, who often feel the assignment they are being given may be unsafe. The charge nurse is your immediate supervisor. She has not generally been responsive to concerns expressed by the staff to her about this problem.