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KMID : 0353019770140010016
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Korean Journal of Public Health
1977 Volume.14 No. 1 p.16 ~ p.26
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A Study on Activities of Nurce Aides in a Hospital
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Abstract
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An activity study of nurse aides engaged in general teaching hospital in a metropolitan city was conducted during the period form July 19 to 24, 1976.
The study population comprised of 12 nurse aides engaged in in-patient units of medical, surgical, ob-gynecology and pediatrics.
The total observation time for 12 nurse aides amounted 34,560 man-minutes or 576 man-hours covering round the clock.
The observation period for each individual observee was 6 days or 48 hours.
The purpose of study was to identify the specific activities performed by area of nursing activity and skill level in order to make efficient utilization of nurse aides in hospital settings.
The analysis was made on the basis of individual daily performance time computed.
The following are the findings:
1. General characteristics of the study population.
① 75.0% of the subjects were in the ages of 19 to 22 years, all unmarried, 88.3% high school graduates, and 66.3% served in the hospital for 1 to 3 years.
② The patient-to-nursing personnel ratio of the studied nursing unit was 32.3 to 8.8 in nurses and 3 in nurse aides.
2. Activities performed by area of nursing.
The unit-centered activity was found to be the major area of daily activity performed by nurse aides as 57.1% was devoted to this purpose.
The other-centered activity (25.2%) was found to follow the next, and 14.1% and 3.6% were spent for patient-centered and personnel-centered activities respectively.
For the detailed analysis, the daily activities performed in terms of time distributions for
1) Nursing unit,
2) Three time shifts (day, evening and night duties),
3) Unit-hours, were computed and results obtained are as following
① There were no distinct patters in activities performed by nursing unit except a relatively heavy time distributions were noticed in pediatric ward with patient-centered and other-centered while the medical ward appeared to have more unit-centered activities compared to those of other units.
② For the activity by unit-hours, the unit-centered activities appeared to increase during the period of 8:31∼9:30, 17:31∼18:30, 22:31∼02:30 and diminished during 12:31∼13:30, 18:31∼19:30, 21:31∼22:30, 02:31∼04:30 while the other-centered activity increased during the same periods.
③ For the activities performed by shifts, a noticeable pattern was observed between the three shifts such as personnel-centreed activities clustered as in day shift while night and evening shifts showed significantly heavy time distributions of unit-centered and other-centered activities.
3. Activities performed by level of skill
The activities performed by level of skill were fairly evenly distributed to three skill levels as 28.3%, 27.4% and 25.2% were allocated for house-keeping messenger, and unclassified activities respectively.
For the nursing supportive activity, 10 percent of daily activity time was allocated while only 2.7% of daily activity time was devoted to administrative activity.
① By nursing unit
Different level of skills was emphasized in different unit as the emphasis in terms of time was nursing supportive activity, clerical activity, house-keeping and messenger activities were found for pediatric ward, surgical ward, gynecological ward and med-surgical ward respectively.
② By unit-hours
Increased messenger activity was noted during the periods of 08:31∼11:30 and 13:31∼15:30 and shortly after shifting in evening duty; house-keeping activity was heavier during the periods of 22:31∼23:30, 01:31∼02:30 and 05:31∼06:30; clerical activity was heavier during the period of 23:31∼01:30; nursing supportive activity was slightly higher in the period of 5:31∼6:30.
③ By shifts
Remarkable decrease of administrative activity was noted in night duty compared with day duty; an even distribution was seen in nursing supportive activity regardless of shift; clerical and house-keeping activity were heavier in night duty.
As for the nurse aide´s activity by area of activity, 13.7 hours per day were spent for unit-centered activity.
By level of skill, 6.5 hours were spent for messenger activity and 6.8 hours for house-keeping activity, which shows that the role of a non-professional personnel is very important, i.e., nurse aides are indispensable as auxiliaries to professional personnel.
It is hoped that the study will be helpful to the establishment and development of the present and evolving role of nurse aides in health care.
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